of the wind in the masts; and then, in a moment, to see them pitching and tumbling astern, dwindling into toys and scarcely perceptible among the lead-coloured waves. But now the crimson had faded out from over the land, and where it had vanished burned a strong and steady light, topping the summit of the highest and outermost cliff. The night fell, and all about the expanse of water innumerable lights started into life: lanterns of vessels in the Downs, of passing ships, of the Goodwin beacons. The clouds which had looked slate-coloured against the sunset were now white, and rolled like great volumes of steam across the stars. Then right ahead of the ship rose a pale white line--a quick, spectral play of froth, and a great, red star shining like an arrested meteor, and which a few minutes before seemed to be many miles distant, grew big and lurid and dangerous. A deep voice sounded along the “Meteor”--“All hands about ship!” A rush of feet and then a silence; round flew the wheel like a firework; the red light ahead swept away giddily to the left. “Helm’s alee!” The canvas shook like thunder, and the passengers crowded aft, wondering to find the ship upright. “Mainsail haul!” And at this signal forth burst a loud chorus; the released braces allowed the yards to fly round, the decks echoed to the tramping of feet and to the cries of men; the vessel lay over as though she must capsize; there was a rush of inexperienced passengers to windward; another hoarse command; round flew the foreyards, and in a few minutes the “Meteor” was darting through the water with her head for Deal, and the pale phosphorescent gleam of the Goodwin Sands dying out upon the sea on her weather quarter. The ship tacked three times during the next hour; and at half-past nine the wind lulled, and the moon came out of the sea, a broad, yellow shield. There was something indescribably solemn in the rising of this orb as she climbed in a haze over the edge of the horizon, and flashed a wedge of quivering light into the tumbling waters. The sails of the “Meteor” caught the radiance presently, and her long wake glittered in the light like a trail of silver spangles. She was in the Downs now, and in a dead calm, and within half-an-hour she was riding at anchor, everything furled aloft, and taut and snug as a man-of-war, with many ships about her, resting like phantom vessels on the surface of the water. An anchor-watch was set, and the crew after smoking, and yarning and lounging about the forecastle, went below, and a deep repose fell upon the erewhile busy labouring ship. The silence was unbroken, save by the murmur of some of the passengers talking in a group around the cuddy skylight, or by the sound of a fiddle played in some one of the nearer-lying vessels, or by the faint, melodious murmur of the breakers boiling upon the pebbly strand of Deal.