Modern Broods; Or, Developments Unlooked ForYonge, Charlotte M. (Charlotte Mary)
General
Modern Broods; Or, Developments Unlooked For
Yonge, Charlotte M. (Charlotte Mary)
Domestic fiction; England -- Social life and customs -- 19th century -- Fiction; English fiction
Before the second could be put off however, the water had reached the
fires; there was a violent lurch, the ship had heeled completely over,
washing many overboard, and of course causing a great confusion among
those who had been steady before, and making the deck almost
perpendicular. The captain, however, succeeded in lowering another boat,
and putting into it, as he trusted, the few remaining women, the Bishop,
and most of the men. This was, of course, that which had safely reached
Corncastle, and of which he only now heard. The last boat was so
overcrowded that he, with three of his crew, had thought it best to
remain for the almost desperate chance of being picked up before they
sank.
He had supposed Mr. Underwood had been washed overboard in the heeling
over of the ship, and that his sister had been put into the first boat;
but presently he heard a call.
“Oh, help me, please!” And he became aware that Sister Angela was
hanging over her brother, who lay crushed by a heavy chest which had
fallen on him, and thrown him against the gunwale, though a moan or two
showed him to be still alive. The remaining sailors removed the weight,
lifted him, and laid him in the best place and position they could, while
his sister hung over him and supported his head. To Miller’s dismayed
exclamation at finding a woman still on board, she replied—
“It was no fault of yours. I hid below. Other lives—the Bishop’s—were
what mattered! I am glad to be here!”
He believed that Mr. Underwood had revived enough to know his sister, for
he had heard her voice talking to him. Yes, and singing; but it was not
for very long. The wreck was in motion, being carried by current and
tide along the Channel, and if it did not sink, might be perceived now
that daylight had come, and a signal of distress might be seen by some
passing vessel.
Seen it was, in fact, and that there were persons to be rescued; and
Blaine, who was on his way from Londonderry to Bristol, in the _Muriel
Ellen_, a cattle-boat, possessed a boat in which to attempt a rescue.
All that experienced sailors could do in transferring the helpless and
unconscious form to the boat first, and then to the sloop had been done;
but it was no wonder that in the transit Angela, more heedful of her
brother’s safety than her own, had fallen between, and been lost in the
waves, to the extreme grief of Tom Blaine, who had been one of her
scholars, and devoted to her, as all the boys of Vale Leston were.
The cattle-boat had few facilities for comfort, and all he could do was
to let Mr. Bernard Underwood lie, as softly as could be contrived, on
deck, and make sail for Ewmouth, so as to land him as near home as
possible. How far he had been conscious it was impossible to say, though
once he had asked for Angela, but had seemed to understand from an
evasion, that she was missing, and had said no more, but muttered parts
of these requests, as if afraid of not being capable of them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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