And you might hear in the bustle and din of quick preparation the boatmen's shouts, 'Ease her down, Bill! just to land her bow over the full!' 'Man that haul-off warp! she'll never get off against them seas unless you man that haul-off warp! Slack it off!' And the coxswain shouts, 'All hands aboard the lifeboat! Cut the lanyard!' Then the trigger flies loose and the stern chain which holds the lifeboat in her position on the beach smokes through the 'ruffles,' or hole in the iron keel through which it runs, as the mighty lifeboat gains speed in her rush down the steep declivity of the beach. As she nears the sea, faster still she slides and shoots over the well-greased skids, urged forwards by her own weight and pulled forwards by the crew, who grasp the haul-off warp moored off shore a long way, and at last, as a warrior to battle, with a final bound she meets the shock of the first great sea. And then she vanishes into the darkness. God speed her on her glorious errand! Close-reefed mizzen and double-reefed storm foresail was the canvas under which the lifeboat that night struggled with the storm, to reach the vessel on the Brake Sand. 'She did fly along, sir, that night, but we were too late! The flare went out when we were half-way!' Alas! alas! while the gallant crew were flying on the wings of mercy and of hope to the rescue, the vessel broke up and vanished with all hands in the deep. The lifeboat cruised round and round in the breakers, but all in vain. The crew gazed and peered into the gloom and listened, and then they shouted all together, but they could hardly hear each other's voices, and there was no answer; all had perished, and rescue close at hand! Suddenly there was a lift in the rain, and between them and the land they saw another flare, 'Down with the foresheet! All hands to the foresheet! Now down with the mizzen sheet!' cried the coxswain, and ten men flew to the sheets. As the lifeboat luffed she lay over to her very bearings, beating famously to windward on her second errand of mercy. It was about midnight, and there was 'a terrible nasty sea,' and a great run under the lifeboat as she neared the land; and the coxswains made out the dim form of a large vessel burning her flare, with masts gone and the sea beating over her. Once again the lifeboat was put about, and came up into the wind's eye, the foresail was got down and the other foresail hoisted on the other side and sheeted home, sails, sheets and blocks rattling furiously in the gale, and forwards on the other tack into the spume and sea-drift the lifeboat 'ratched.' Between them and the vessel that was burning her signal of distress, the keen eyes of the lifeboatmen discerned an object in the sea, 'not more than fifty fathoms off, as much as ever it was, it was that bitter dark!' Another wreck! 'Let us save them at any rate!' said the storm-beaten lifeboatmen, as a feeble cry was heard.