The gas-flames in the few lamps along the seafront were wildly dancing, their glazed frames rattled furiously, and I remember noticing, even in that moment of excitement, that one of the lamp-posts which stood a few yards away from our house had been arched by the wind as though it were a curve of leaden pipe. The two or three shops which faced the sea had their shutters up to save the windows, and the blackness of the night seemed to be rather heightened than diminished by the dim and leaping glares of the street lights. But as I neared the lifeboat house my vision was somewhat assisted by the whiteness of the foam boiling in thunder a long space out. It flung a dim, elusive, ghostly illumination of its own up on the air. I could see the outline of the boat-house against it, the shapes of men writhing, as it seemed, upon the slipway; the figure of the boat herself, which had already been eased by her own length out of the house; and I could even discern, by the aid of that wonderful light of froth, that most of or all her crew were already in her, and that they were stepping her mast, which the roof of the house would not suffer her to keep aloft when she was under shelter. 'Here's the cox'n!' shouted a voice. 'All right, men!' I roared, and with that I rushed through the door of the house, and in a bound or two gained the interior of the boat and my station on the after-grating. CHAPTER III. IN THE LIFEBOAT. Now had come the moment when I should need the utmost exertion of nerve and coolness my nature was equal to. There was a large globular lamp alight in the little building--its lustre vaguely touched the boat, and helped me to see what was going on and who were present. Nevertheless I shouted: 'Are all hands aboard?' 'All hands!' came a hurricane response. 'All got your belts on?' I next cried. 'All!' was the answer--that is to say, all excepting myself, who, having worn a cork-jacket once, vowed never again to embark thus encumbered. 'Are your sails hooked on ready for hoisting?' I shouted. 'All ready, sir!' 'And your haul-off rope?' 'All ready, sir!' 'Now then, my lads--look out, all hands!' There was a moment's pause: 'Let her go!' I roared. A man stood close under the stern, ready to pass his knife through the lashing which held the chain to the boat. 'Stand by!' he shouted. 'All gone!' I heard the clank of the chain as it fell, an instant after the boat was in motion--slowly at first, but in a few breaths she had gathered the full way that her own weight and the incline gave her, and rushed down the slipway, but almost noiselessly, so thickly greased was the timber structure, with some hands hoisting the foresail as she sped, and others grimly and motionless facing seawards, ready to grasp and drag upon the haul-off rope the moment the craft should be water-borne amid the smothering surf.