Quite plainly I could see the Rotunda on St. Paul’s, and by all appearance I was being driven in a little to the westward of it. When lifted up by the seas, as I came nearer and nearer the shore, I saw what looked like a little bay with a belt, or patch, of sandy beach at the head of it. Whilst earnestly praying that I might be fortunate enough to be drawn into the bay, my heart went down again when I caught sight of the fearful breakers that were running across its entrance. These breakers lay directly in front of me, and I could see no way in, except by passing through them. Gathering my scattered senses together as well as I could, I took a fresh hold of my boards, and prepared for a last desperate effort. As I got close to the broken waters I could hear their thundering roar, although they were still to leeward of my raft. After some minutes’ anxious suspense, I reached the dreaded breakers; then almost instantly my boards were ruthlessly snatched away, in spite of my best efforts to retain them. I felt myself being turned over and over like a rolling ball; at the same time I experienced, more than at any previous period, an awful sense of utter helplessness. The thick foam filled my mouth and nostrils so much that I felt all the sensations of suffocation, and believed my end had come. Just then another sea threw me clear of the foam and dashed me, face and knees downwards, on to some rocks which were sunk a little under water. Instinctively I threw out my arms, and thus prevented my face from striking the jutting stones, while the thickness of the life-belt kept the blows from my body. Dazed, and almost senseless as I was, I could see that the sandy patch was still a distance off, too far away for me to expect the incoming breaker to carry me there. My strength being gone, I felt it utterly useless to attempt to swim to the beach, and hence I came to the conclusion that if the next wave did not take me in, it would dash me against the rocks and knock out the little life I had left. Along, it came roaring, but being too weak and stupid to make ready for it, I was caught broadside on, lifted high above the rocks, and whirled away helpless as a log, right up on the sandy shore, As I rolled over and over on the sand the motion made my neck and head feel as if they were going to burst in pieces. Suddenly the rolling ceased, then I became aware that the back-wash of the wave was taking me out again. In sheer desperation I clutched the sand, but my fingers, being numbed and nerveless, had no power of grasping. Then I dug my knuckles in as well as I could, but all to no purpose, out I kept going, as helpless as when I came in! [Illustration: two sailing ships] [Illustration: Decoration] CHAPTER IX. THE LANDING. “I long to lay this painful head, And aching heart beneath the soil, To slumber in that dreamless bed From all my toil.