His own suffering made him perceive that the rum would be a curse to them whilst it lasted, inducing them to drink it, and presently maddening them with fresh accesses of thirst. The boy was suffering again, and was crawling upon his hands and knees over the thwarts in search of some rain moisture; and presently Holdsworth saw him put his tongue against the mast and lick it. Johnson hung, with an air of despairful recklessness, over the boat’s side, dashing the water in his face, and letting the foam fly up his arm and soak his breast. The boat presently made a plunge downwards--a long, wild, sweeping fall; the roaring of the waves sounded overhead; the sail flapped, and there was a pause of breathless calm that lasted some moments. Holdsworth looked behind him and shrieked out: “Seize the boy, and throw yourself down!” The man extended his hands, and, grappling the child, rolled backwards, under a thwart. It came--a huge, green, unbroken sea, arching its emerald top on a level with the yard of the sail, and following the boat with a spring like a tiger’s. Holdsworth stretched himself out, his feet hard against the aftermost thwart, his back squared, his elbows out, his hands grasping the yoke-lines with a death grip. Up went the boat--stem up--yet up! as though she must be flung clean over on end; then came the rush and roar of water--it fell with a weight of lead on Holdsworth’s back, and beat, with a ponderous single blow, the breath out of him, but could not root him from his seat; it broke into a vast surface of foam, divided, and swept forward, hissing, spluttering, bubbling, raging; met at an angle at the boat’s bows and half filled her! Down she swooped into another hollow, and half the water ran out over her bows, the remainder, as she rose, came rushing aft and filled the stern-sheets; and up and down, up and down, it washed. But the boat still lived, and Holdsworth was her master. “Bear a hand aft here and bale her out!” he shouted. Johnson let go the half-drowned child, and struggled over the thwarts, blowing and shaking his soaked hair like rope-yarns off his face, his clothes streaming with water; flopped down, found the cocoa-nut shell, and baled with fury. The child crouched in the bows, too terrified to cry. The boat flashed along, skimming the frothing heads of the waves; she had outlived an exceptionally heavy sea, and seemed to feel her triumph as she flew.