We watched them as they went further and further from the shore, the seamen shouting with excitement, and even laying wagers one against another, though, being bereft of everything save their weapons and some few articles that were in the boat, it seemed to me great folly. And when after a long chase the boat was overhauled near the archway in the red rock of which I have spoken, they fell into a perfect ecstasy of joy, clapping each other on the back and shouting like frantic people. We saw Chick baling out the boat, Billy helping him, and as they were a long while doing this, it was plain that she held a great quantity of water and would most likely have foundered in no long time. Whilst they were at this work of baling, the raft floated away, and neglecting it they began to pull back to the beach. But they had not taken many strokes before we saw them turn again, and the men around me burst forth into horrible execrations, supposing in the first moment (so base of mind were they, as well as witless) that Chick was purposing to row away and desert them. But I told them that Billy had only remembered the raft, and so it proved, for they rowed after it, and having catched it up, fastened it by a rope to the boat's stern and so headed again towards the shore. While they were yet some distance off, the ground beneath our feet trembled and we heard a great rumbling, and the sea was mightily troubled, whereupon the men fell into their panic again, fearing that an earthquake would swallow them ere ever they got clear away. They cried in great terror to Chick to haste, and while the boat was yet some fathoms' length from the beach, Wabberley and two or three more dashed into the sea, and wading out, scrambled into the boat, with such violence that they were not very far short of overturning it. Which seeing, all the rest of the seamen rushed to do likewise, Hoggett and some others carrying all the articles that were in the broken boat, and then I saw that the boat, being the smaller of the two, could not possibly contain us all, and indeed the men saw that too, and there was such a fight to win places that I thought the boat would fill with water and sink. As for me, I stood watching in a kind of amazement, now in the mind to rush towards the boat with the others and fight for a place, now deeming it better to wait until I saw to what issue things came. [Sidenote: Abandoned]