A few days later the "Doria" captured an English snow,--an armed merchant-vessel of peculiar rig,--and Barney was detached to take her home. As had happened before with the "Doria's" prizes when Biddle was in command, the brig's crew was too small to man them, and Barney made up the needed number from the prisoners. On the way north he had heavy weather, for it was now December,--a month in which no seaman likes to pass Cape Hatteras,--and day after day the vessel encountered a succession of furious gales and heavy seas. Keeping well out to the eastward until he had fetched a point from which he could reach the Chesapeake, Barney now headed for the land, and at last found himself, on Christmas night, in a driving easterly storm, close on the breakers of the Jersey coast. To keep his vessel away from the lee shore and its certain perils, the young prize-master, as his only course, resolved to ride out the gale and let go his only anchor. So the night fell upon him and his men,--a fearful night, what with the roaring tempest, and the sea rolling mountains high, while every wave broke over the bows of the ship. It seemed each instant, from the violence of the sea, that the small cable must part, and with it she would lose her only hope. The men, yielding themselves to blank despair, were sinking into lethargy. It was then that Barney, though he had little cause to hope himself, talked to them with cheering words, trying to rouse them from their stupor. He called to mind the battles they had fought, and how they had been ready to stand up bravely before the enemy and face death in another form. "I am not much of a chaplain, my good lads," he said, "but this I know, that the same Power that protected you then can protect you now; and if we are all to go to Davy Jones's locker, we might as well go with a bold face as a sheepish one." Barney's good example shamed the men to greater courage; but the night wore on and the day broke, and still the fury of the storm kept up. The crew were in the tops, and Barney with them. Soon a cry was heard of "Sail ho!" and every eye was turned toward a small sloop, which appeared in sight driven before the gale, yet trying to make an offing. Anxiously the men watched the frail boat, one moment rising on the wave till they could see her keel, and the next plunging down till she was lost to view. Each time it seemed as if she could not rise again; but each time she shot up on the foaming crest, seemingly steadying herself an instant before the next downward plunge. Suddenly there was heard a long, shrill shriek of terror piercing through the din and crash of breakers, and the sloop was swallowed up in the seething waters. After this sight no words of Barney's could rouse his men from their terrors. But fortunately toward the middle of the afternoon the wind abated and the sea gradually went down. Barney lost no time in getting his crew down from aloft as soon as it was safe, and they were only too glad to come.