But scarcely had this been completed when the squall struck the ship, and the waves followed till the vessel was thrown far over on her side; and Brandon seizing Beatrice in one arm, clung with the other to the edge of the skylight, and thus kept himself upright. He rested now for a moment. “I must go on deck,” he said. “I do not wish you to leave me,” was her answer. Nothing more was said. Brandon at once lifted her with one arm as though she were a child and clambered along, grasping such fixtures as afforded any thing to which he could cling; and thus, with hands and feet, groped his way to the door of the cabin, which was on the windward side. There were two doors, and between them was a seat. “This,” said he, “is the safest place for you. Can you hold on for a short time? If I take you on deck you will be exposed to the waves.” “I will do whatever you say,” she replied; and clinging to the arm of the almost perpendicular seat, she was able to sustain herself there amidst the tossing and swaying of the ship. Brandon then clambered out on deck. The ship lay far over. The waves came leaping upon her in successive surges. All around the sea was glistening with phosphorescent lustre, and when at times the lightning flashed forth it lighted up the scene, and showed the ocean stirred up to fiercest commotion. It seemed as though cataracts of water were rushing over the doomed ship, which now lay helpless, and at the mercy of the billows. The force of the wind was tremendous, exceeding any thing that Brandon had ever witnessed before. What most surprised him now was the inaction of the ship’s company. Why was not something being done? Where was the Captain? He called out his name; there was no response. He called after the mate; there was no answer. Instantly he conjectured that in the first fierce onset of the storm both Captain and mate had been swept away. How many more of that gallant company of brave fellows had perished he knew not. The hour was a perilous and a critical one. He himself determined to take the lead. Through the midst of the storm, with its tumult and its fury, there came a voice as full and clear as a trumpet-peal, which roused all the sailors, and inspired them once more with hope. “Cut away the masts!” The men obeyed, without caring who gave the order. It was the command which each man had been expecting, and which he knew was the thing that should be done. At once they sprang to their work. The main-mast had already been cut loose. Some went to the fore-mast, others to the mizzen. The vast waves rolled on; the sailors guarded as best they could against the rush of each wave, and then sprang in the intervals to their work. It was perilous in the highest degree, but each man felt that his own life and the lives of all the others depended upon the accomplishment of this work, and this nerved the arm of each to the task.