In yesterday’s log I forgot to mention an incident that happened which came very nearly being a lamentable accident. After we had worn around, at about thirty minutes past one, while some of the men were hauling taut the weather forebrace, we were boarded by an enormous sea that came whooping over the weather-side. The whole of the starboard watch, including the second mate, were hauling on the brace when the sea broke on board and fell directly upon them. I never saw anything like the scene that followed. The men absolutely disappeared from view. It was as though they had gone through the deck. Only once before had we seen so great a volume of water on a ship’s deck, and that was during our first voyage when we were hove down to the turnbuckles in the North Atlantic. Yesterday it was, at the very least, two feet deep on the level, and it filled the galley and carpenter-shop, putting out the fires in the donkey-boiler, and this through the lee doors. During all this time we looked in vain for the sight of a human being. Not one was to be seen on the main-deck, and the water was dashing up twenty or thirty feet into the air at every heave. Gradually it began to run off, and now and then a clumsy, yellow bundle loomed up out of a snarl of ropes, sat up for a second, and then went whizzing away to leeward. Again a man would gain his feet and clutch frantically at belaying-pins; but before he could support himself his legs would slide from under him, and he would be swept into the water-ways like a cork in a sluice. When all but a few inches of water had run off, and it was deep only in the lee scuppers, we perceived a knot of men away aft wedged between the bitts and the rail not far from the cabin bulkhead, entangled in a fearful snarl of gear. So tightly were they packed away that at first it seemed as though there were only two men there; but one by one they crawled apart till three half-drowned sailors sat wabbling on the deck, and then we saw that another luckless creature was lying prone in the scuppers. Slowly and painfully he got his legs under him, and, waiting for a lurch, with an effort reached his feet. It was Mr. Rarx, one of the most powerful men on board, and he was gasping for breath. It seems that they had all been swept aft together, and all were badly used up, especially Mr. Rarx, who formed the base of the wedge. He says that he was completely under water for a good deal more than a minute.