The party were joined by Dolores and Wilfred at Liverpool; Bernard having undertaken to establish the latter at Colombo in hands as safe as might be. CHAPTER XXX—THE MAIDEN ROCKS “What need we more if hearts be true, Our voyage safe, our port in view.” —KEBLE. A TELEGRAM that a steamer had been wrecked on the Maiden Rocks filled three homes with dismay. The rocks were sought out in maps, and found to be specks lying between County Antrim and Scotland—no doubt terrible in their reality. Another day brought something more definite. It _was_ the _Afra_,—“wrecked in the fog of October 11th. Boats got off.” That was all; but a day’s post brought letters, of which the fullest was from Dolores: “CORNCASTLE, LARNE, CO. ANTRIM, IRELAND, _October_ 12. “DEAREST AUNT LILY,— “I trust Phyllis has by this time heard from Bernard, as I heard him called on, as a good oarsman, to go in the first boat, and we saw Angela’s bonnet. We—that is Wilfred, Nag, and the Bishop—are all safe here, with eight or nine others. Will will do well, I trust. He quite owes his life to Nag. This is how it was: We had not long been out of the Mersey before an impenetrable fog came down upon us, and we could not see across the deck; but on we went, on what proved to be our blind way, till, after a night and day, just as we were getting up from dinner, there came a hideous shock and concussion, throwing us all about the room; and in less than a minute it was repeated, with horrible crackings, tearings, yells and shouts. No one needed to tell us what it meant, and down came the call, ‘Don’t wait to save your things, only wraps, ladies! Up on deck! Life-belts if you can!’ I remember Bernard standing at the top of the ladder, helping us up, and somehow, I understand from him, that we were on a reef, and might either remain there, and sink, or be washed off. The fog was clearing, and there was a dim light up high, somewhere, one of the lighthouses, I believe. I don’t quite know how it all went; I think we kept in the background, round the Bishop, and that a boat full of emigrant women was put off. I know there were only about half a dozen women left, who had been crying and refusing to leave their husbands; and about thirty altogether, men and women, were somehow got into our boat with the chief mate; the Bishop all consolation and prayer; poor Wilfred limp, cold and trembling, for he had been very seasick till the last moment, when Bernard pulled him out of his berth, and put him into a lifebelt. The sea was not very rough, with an east wind; but the mate said the current was so strong he could make no way against it. It would bring us on to the Irish