The two men remained for a short time on the main-yard, and then came down, leaving the sail much more secure than they had found it. Cornish despatched his breakfast, and the boatswain came to me. "Do you see the long-boat now, sir?" "No," I replied; "she's hidden in the rain yonder. By Heaven! it _is_ coming down!" I did not exaggerate; the horizon was grey with the rain: it looked like steam rising from a boiling sea. "It 'll keep 'em busy bailing," said the boatswain. "Hold on here," I cried, "till I get my oilskins." I was back again in a few moments, and he went away to drape himself for the downfall, and to advise Cornish to do the same. I left the wheel for a second or two to close one of the skylights, and as I did so a flash of lightning seemed to set the ship on fire, and immediately came a deafening crash of thunder. I think there is something more awful in the roar of thunder heard at sea than on shore, unless you are among mountains; you get the full intensity of it, the mighty outburst smiting the smooth surface of the water, which in itself is a wonderful vehicle of sound, and running onwards for leagues without meeting with any impediment to check or divert it. I hastened to see if the lightning conductor ran clear to the water, and finding the end of the wire coiled up in the port main-chains, flung it overboard and resumed my place at the wheel. Now that the vast surface of cloud was well forward of overhead, I observed that its front was an almost perfect semicircle, the extremities at either point of the horizon projecting like horns. There still remained, embraced by these horns, a clear expanse of steel-coloured sky. _There_ the sea was light, but all to starboard it was black, and the terrible shadow was fast bearing down upon the ship. Crack! the lightning whizzed, and turned the deck, spars, and rigging into a network of blue fire. The peal that followed was a sudden explosion--a great dead crash, as though some mighty ponderous orb had fallen from the highest heaven upon the flooring of the sky and riven it. Then I heard the rain. I scarcely know which was the more terrifying to see and hear--the rain, or the thunder and lightning. It was a cataract of water falling from a prodigious elevation. It was a dense, impervious liquid veil, shutting out all sight of sea and sky. It tore the water into foam in striking it. Then, _boom_! down it came upon us. I held on by the wheel, and the boatswain jammed himself under the grating. It was not rain only--it was hail as big as eggs; and the rain drops were as big as eggs too. There was not a breath of air. This terrific fall came down in perfectly perpendicular lines; and as the lightning rushed through it, it illuminated with its ghastly effulgence a broad sheet of water.