Towards daylight the ship sighted Dover and the master made for it. Here the local seafarers were in great numbers by the shore on the look-out for wreckage, for the gale had blown down their own barns and trees. But the French skipper was either a very bad seaman, or his ship was extremely unhandy, for the craft went smack up against Dover pier and split, whereupon the Frenchman cheerfully announced: “Mes amis, nous sommes perdus.” Herbert, though in the toils of sea-sickness, then emerged from his cabin, climbed part of the way up the mast and waved his sword for help. A local six-oared boat then came off, into which Herbert was the first to enter. Lucy was half dead with sea-sickness, but was lifted from the cabin to the boat, and thus they were saved. Other boats rowed off the rest of the men and the horses. The ship, concluded Herbert, “was wholly split and cast away, insomuch that in pity to the master, Sir Thomas Lucy and myself gave thirty pounds towards his loss, which yet was not so great as we thought, since the tide now ebbing, he recovered the broken parts of his ship.” Dean Swift, in _Gulliver’s Travels_, refers to the ship _Adventure_ riding in the Downs at the end of June 1702. She was commanded by Captain John Nicholas, a Cornishman, and bound for Surat. At the Cape of Good Hope they landed for fresh water, but other reasons detained them until the end of March. A good passage was then made till north of Madagascar, when bad weather was encountered. The spritsail (the square-sail set on a small mast at the end of the bowsprit) was therefore taken in, the mizzen was handed, and the guns secured. Rather than heave-to, the captain decided to run before the wind—“spooning” is the technical expression—the foresail was reefed, the fore-sheet hauled aft, the helm put hard aweather, and “the ship wore bravely.” But the foresail became split, and the yard was hauled down. “It was a very fierce storm; the sea broke strange and dangerous. We hauled off upon the lanyard of the whip-staff, and helped the man at helm.” For there was no steering wheel in use yet, and this was not introduced until about fifty years later. The tiller from the rudder was controlled by a vertical bar or lever, called a “whip-staff,” and the lanyards would naturally enough be used, as it is employed to this day for assisting the helm of sailing yachts.