"The clouds had broken with the dying of the gale, and the moon shone out, lighting up the foaming sea far and wide, and showing our water-logged or sinking craft. Every wave that swept over us found its way below, and we settled deeper and deeper. Still, if we could only hold on till morning, those seas are alive with small craft, and we stood a good chance of being picked off. I was saying as much to Marston when the 'Ercolano' gave a lurch and then dove bows first into the sea. A great wave seemed to curl over us, and then to thrust us by the shoulders down into the depths, and all was darkness and water. I went down, down, and still I was dragged lower still, though the pressure from above ceased, and I was struggling to rise. I struck out with hands and feet;--I was held fast. I felt behind me and found a hand grasping my coat-tails. Marston had seized me, and with the other hand was clinging to the iron rail on the top of the paddle-box,--clinging with the death-grip of a drowning man, if you know what that is. I tried to unclasp the fingers,--to drive him from his hold on the rail. Of course I couldn't; it was Death's hand, not his, that was holding there, and my own strength was going, when a thought flashed into my mind. I tore open my coat, and it slipped from me like a grape-skin from the grape, and I went up like an arrow. "Never shall I forget the blessed light of heaven, and the sweet air in my lungs once more. Bad off as I was, it was better than being anchored to a sinking wreck by a dead man's grasp. I heard a voice near me that night repeating the Latin prayers of the Romish Church for the departing soul, but I couldn't see the speaker. The moon had gone under a cloud again, but there was light enough for me to catch a glimpse of some floating wreck on the crest of a wave above me; and then it came down right on top of me,--a lot of rigging and a spar or two,--our topmast and yard, which had gone over the side just before we foundered. I climbed on to it, and found my prospects hugely improving,--especially as clinging to the other end was the soldier left on board. As soon as I could persuade him I was no spook or mermaid, he was almost as pleased as I was, especially when he found I was the '_eretico_.' He was a Swiss, it seemed, of King Ferdinand's regiments, going home on furlough, and a Protestant, which was why he was left on board.