"Yes, they have indeed, Charlie; little friendless sailor-boys dashed on far-away rocks that splintered their ships to atoms, or swallowed up when their vessel foundered in great typhoons, thousands of miles away from home and England, in unknown seas; little boys like you, Charlie; and they have died bravely, too, though no living soul was near them to hear their cries, and nothing to mark their graves but the bubble for one minute while they sank." "Have they, Walter?" "Ay, many and many a time they have; and the same God Who called for their lives gave them courage and strength to die, as He will give us if there is need." There was a pause, and then Charlie said, "Talk to me, Walter; it prevents my listening to the flapping and plunging of the boat, and all the other noises. Walter, I think... I think we shall die." "Courage, brother, I have hope yet; and if we die we will die like this together--I will not let you go. Our bodies shall be washed ashore together--not separated, Charlie, even in death." "You have been a dear, dear good brother to me. How I love you, Walter!" and as he pressed yet closer to him, he said more bravely, "What hope have you then, Walter?" "Look up, Charlie; you see that light?" "Yes; what is it?" "Sharksfin Lighthouse; don't you remember seeing it sometimes at night from Saint Win's? Yes; and those lights twinkling far-off are Saint Win's. Those must be the school lights; and those long windows you can just see are the chapel windows. They are in chapel now, or the lights wouldn't be there. Perhaps some of our friends--Power, perhaps, and Eden--are praying for us; they must have missed us since tea-time." "How I wish we were with them!" "Perhaps we may be again; and all the wiser and better in heart and life for this solemn time, Charlie. If we are but carried by this wind and current within hearing of the lighthouse!" The Sharksfin Lighthouse is built on a sharp high rock two miles out at sea. I have watched it from Bleak Point on a bright, warm summer's day, when the promontory around me was all ablaze with purple heather and golden gorse, and there was not breeze enough to shake the wing of the butterfly as it rested on the blue-bell, or disturb the honey-laden bee as it murmured in the thyme. Yet even then the waters were seething and boiling in never-ended tumult about those hideous sunken rocks; and the ocean all around was hoary as with the neesings of a thousand leviathans floundering in its monstrous depths. You may guess what they are on a wild February night--how, in the mighty rush of the Atlantic, the torn breakers beat about them with tremendous rage, till the whole sea is in angry motion like some demon caldron that seethes over roaring flame.