When we get on deck again we find that the evening, but not the _White Dove_, has advanced. There is no wind; there is no rain; around us there is the silent, glassy, lilac-grey sea, which, far away in the west, has one or two gleams of a dull bronze on it, as if some afterglow were struggling through the clouds at the horizon. Along the Gribun cliffs, and over the islands, the gloom has surely increased; it were better if we were in some shelter for this night. Then a noise is heard that seems to impose a sudden silence—thunder, low, distant, and rumbling. But there is no splendid gleam through the gathering gloom of the night: the Gribun cliffs have not spoken yet. John of Skye has carelessly seated himself on one of the deck-stools; his arm hangs idly on the tiller; we guess, rather than hear, that he is regaling himself with the sad, monotonous _Farewell to Fuineray_. He has got on his black oilskins, though there is not a drop of rain. By and by, however, it being now quite dark, he jumps to his feet, and appears to listen intently. "Ay, do ye hear it?" he says, with a short laugh. "And it iss off the land it iss coming!" He calls aloud—"Look out boys! it is a squahl coming over, and we’ll hev the topsail down whatever!" Then we hear a distant roaring; and presently the headsails are violently shaken, and the great boom swings over as John puts the helm up to get way on her. The next instant we are racing in for the land, as if we mean to challenge the heavy squall that is tearing across from the unseen Gribun cliffs. And now the rain-clouds break in deluges; the men in their black oilskins go staggering this way and that along the slippery decks; the _White Dove_ is wrestling with the sudden storm; another low murmur of thunder comes booming through the darkness. What is that solitary light far in there towards the land?—dare any steamer venture so near the shore on such a night? And we, too; would it not be safer for us to turn and run out to sea rather than beat against a squall into the narrow and shallow channels of Ulva’s Sound? But John of Skye is not afraid. The wind and sea cannot drown his strident voice; the rain deluge cannot blind the trained eyes; the men on the look-out—when the bow of the boat springs high on a wave, we can see the black figures against the sombre sky—know the channels too; we are not afraid to make for Ulva’s Sound. There is a wild cry from one of the women; she has caught sight, through the gloom, of white foam dashing on the rocks. "It is all right, mem!" John calls aloud, with a laugh; but all the same the order is shouted, "_Ready about!_"—"_Ready about!_" is the call coming back to us from the darkness. "_’Bout ship!_" and then away she sheers from that ugly coast.