- end_line
- 3228
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T20:48:15.149Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 3202
- text
- about!” were now shouted on all sides; while distracted by a thousand
orders, they ran hither and thither, fairly panic-stricken.
It seemed all over with us; and I was just upon the point of throwing
the ship full into the wind (a step, which, saving us for the instant,
would have sealed our fate in the end), when a sharp cry shot by my ear
like the flight of an arrow.
It was Salem: “All ready for’ard; hard down!”
Round and round went the spokes—the Julia, with her short keel,
spinning to windward like a top. Soon, the jib-sheets lashed the stays,
and the men, more self-possessed, flew to the braces.
“Main-sail haul!” was now heard, as the fresh breeze streamed fore and
aft the deck; and directly the after-yards were whirled round.
In a half-a-minute more, we were sailing away from the land on the
other tack, with every sail distended.
Turning on her heel within little more than a biscuit’s toss of the
reef, no earthly power could have saved us, were it not that, up to the
very brink of the coral rampart, there are no soundings.
- title
- Chunk 4