4

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28 Snapshots from the North Pacife.

go to minister to the few white people. On gur return we
rowed a couple of miles, because it was calm, after which an
adverse gale sprang on us. For miles our course lay between
an extensive reef to seaward and a rocky coast, from which
in three places dangerous reefs stand out. While the day-
light lasted our hearts were light, and we enjoyed the
pace at which, under close-reefed canvas, we raced over the
waves. But to beat to windward amongst those rocks in the
darkness that became black, and to be drenched with the cold
spray blown from the wave-crest, was a very different thing.
Except close to the reef or in-shore, the water is from sixty
to a hundred fathoms deep—to us unfathomable. I had no
sounding-line on board. But with a fishing-line and a large
jack-knife at its end we sounded, and the moment we got
soundings we put about on the other tack. I tried to buoy
up the spirits of the lads, but at last we all became as silent
as fish, excepting when I gave orders to handle the sheets
for going about on obtaining soundings. We often heard
the breakers, but could see nothing in the darkness. It was
past midnight
when we felt our
way into a shel-
tered cove to
anchor for the
night. There we
thanked God,
and huddled un-
der the decked-
in part forward,
where on very
hard boards we
stretched
ourselves in
our drench-
ed clothes,
ni and indiffer-
. Chief's Sepulchre at Massett. ent ,to the

Serra