'By half-past four o'clock in the afternoon it was drawing on dusk, and about that hour we sighted the revolving light of the Kentish Knock lightship, and a little after five we were pretty close to her. She is a big red-hulled boat, with the words 'Kentish Knock' written in long white letters on her sides, and, dark as it was, we could see her flung up, and rushing down fit to roll her over and over; and the way she pitched and went out of sight, and then ran up on the black heights of water, gave me a better notion of the fearfulness of that sea than I had got by watching the tug or noticing our own lively dancing. The tug hailed her first, and two men looking over her side answered; but what they said didn't reach us in the lifeboat. Then the steamer towed us abreast, but the tide caught our warp and gave us a sheer that brought us much too close alongside of her. When the sea took her she seemed to hang right over us, and the sight of that great dark hull, looking as if, when it fell, it must come right atop of us, made us want to sheer off, I can tell you. I sung out, "Have you seen the ship?" And one of the men bawled back, "Yes." "How does she bear?" "Nor'-west by north." "Have you seen anything go to her?" The answer I caught was, "A boat." Some of our men said the answer was, "A lifeboat," but most of us only heard, "A boat." 'The tug was now towing ahead, and we went past the lightship, but ten minutes after Tom Friend sings out, "They're burning a light aboard her!" and looking astern I saw they had fired a red signal light that was blazing over the bulwark in a long shower of sparks. The tug put her helm down to return, and we were brought broadside to the sea. Then we felt the power of those waves, sir. It looked a wonder that we were not rolled over and drowned, every man of us. We held on with our teeth clenched, and twice the boat was filled, and the water up to our throats. "Look out for it, men!" was always the cry. But every upward send emptied the noble little craft, like pulling out a plug in a wash-basin, and in a few minutes we were again alongside the light-vessel. This time there were six or seven men looking over the side. "What do you want?" we shouted. "Did you see the Sunk lightship's rocket?" they all yelled out together. "Yes. Did you say you saw a boat?" "No," they answered, showing we had mistaken their first reply. On which I shouted to the tug, "Pull us round to the Long Sand Head buoy!" and then we were under weigh again, meeting the tremendous seas. There was only a little bit of moon, westering fast, and what there was of it showed but now and again, as the heavy clouds opened and let the light of it down. Indeed, it was very dark, though there was some kind of glimmer in the foam which enabled us to mark the tug ahead. "Bitter cold work, Charlie," says old Tom Cooper to me: "but," says he, "it's colder for the poor wretches aboard the wreck, if