The whole surface of the sea was like a great expanse of molten silver which shimmered and sparkled under the rays of the wintry sun. The prospect was now for a smooth voyage, and the sailormen scraped the ice from rail and deck, and the passengers who had been confined to the cabin now came on deck and raced about like children under the influence of the pure air. The sky was very clear above, but all around the horizon a low haze lay upon the water. “Isn’t this glorious, Peggy?” cried Harriet dancing about the deck like a wind sprite. “After all, there is nothing like the sea.” “’Tis wonderful,” answered Peggy with awe in her tone. The vast spread of the waters, the immensity of the sky, the intense silence through which the creaking of the boats as they swung at the davits, and the straining of the shrouds as the ship rolled sounded loud and clear, all appealed to her sense of the sublime. “I hope ’twill be as fine as this all the way to Georgia,” said Harriet. “And that seems to be the prospect.” The captain of the vessel, a bluff Englishman, was passing at the moment and caught the last remark. He paused beside the maidens. “It won’t be fine long,” he declared gruffly. “With a ground swell and a sinking temperature always look for squalls. Look there at the north!” The haze on the horizon to the north was rather thicker than elsewhere, and a few thin streaky clouds straggled across the clear, cold heavens. It told nothing to the girls, but the skipper’s face grew grave, and he hurried forward to give some commands. “Furl topsails!” he shouted to the mate, “and have the mainsails reefed down!” “Ay, ay, sir,” came the response, and instantly the men began hauling at the halliards, or sprang to the yards above to tuck away the great sails making all snug for the coming storm. Even Peggy, unused to the sea as she was, could see that a storm was about to burst upon them. The north was now one great rolling black cloud with an angry ragged fringe which bespoke the violence of the wind that drove it. The whole great mass was sweeping onward with majestic rapidity, darkening the ocean beneath it. “Get below there,” shouted the captain as he suddenly caught sight of the two girls still standing on deck watching the approach of the storm with fascinated eyes. “Get below, I say! D’ye want to be blowed away? Here she comes!” As he spoke the wind broke in all its fury. The schooner heeled over until her lee rail touched the water, and lay so for a moment in a smother of foam. Gradually she rose a little, staggered and trembled like a living thing, and then plunged away through the storm. It was a wild and dreary night that followed. Shut in the dark of the cabin Peggy and Harriet clung to each other, or to lockers, to keep from being dashed across the floor of the tossing vessel. All night long there was no chance for sleep. Every moment it seemed as though the ship must go down at the next onslaught of the waves.