"It was impossible for me to stay to the end, for no one could guess how long the poor thing would hold out. I did my best to comfort the father, and then I left, bringing away a kind message to you, my poor Rosebud. She seems to have loved you dearly, and said you were very kind to her at school." Rose had covered her face with her hands, and with difficulty restrained her tears. "But you said the doctors had _some_ hope, father; didn't you?" she asked. "No, darling, the doctors had none--no more had I. It was her poor father who hoped against hope. Death was written on her sweet face, and it could not be far off. I doubt not she is now with the Lord. When I was leaving, she gave me a small packet for you; but that, with everything else in the _North Star_, has gone to the bottom. But we must be goin' now," continued the captain, rising. "I see Jeff is gettin' wearied--an' no wonder. Besides, it won't do to keep you two up here talkin' till daylight." Jeff protested that he was not weary--that in such company it was impossible for him to tire! but Rose was too much distressed by her father's narrative to observe the compliment. Still, in spite of his protest, there was something in our hero's manner and look which belied his words; and when he returned to the coastguard station that day, and was about to lie down for much-needed repose, his friend and mate, David Bowers, was surprised to see him turn deadly pale, stagger, and fall on his bed in a state of insensibility. "Hallo! Jeff, what's wrong?" exclaimed Bowers, starting up, seizing his friend's arm, and giving him a shake, for he was much puzzled. To see a man knocked into a state of insensibility was nothing new or unfamiliar to Bowers, but to see a powerful young fellow like Jeff go off in a fainting fit like a woman was quite out of his experience. Jeff, however, remained deaf to his mate's hallo! and when at last a doctor was fetched, it was found that he had been seriously injured; insomuch that the medical man stood amazed when he heard how he had walked several miles and sat up for several hours after his exertions and accident at the wreck. That medical man, you see, happened to be an old bachelor, and probably did not know what love can accomplish! "I very much fear," he said to Captain Millet, after inspecting his patient, "that the poor fellow has received some bad internal injuries. The mast, or whatever it was, must have struck him a tremendous blow, for his side is severely bruised, and two of his ribs are broken." "Pretty tough ribs to break, too," remarked the captain, with a look of profound distress. "You are right," returned the doctor; "remarkably tough, but not quite fitted to withstand such a powerful battering-ram as the mainmast of a six-hundred-ton barque."