Afloat and Ashore Author:James Fenimore Cooper Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: France, it was still bent, with the anchor fished. We had talked of stowing the latter in-board, but, having land in sight, it was not done. In two minutes it wa... more »s a cock-bill, and, in two more, let go. None knew whether we should find a bottom ; but Kite soon sang out to " snub," the anchor being down, with only six fathoms out. The lead corroborated this, and we had the comfortable assurance of being not only among breakers, but just near the coast. The holding-ground, however, was reported good, and we went to work and rolled up all our rags. In half an hour the ship was snug, riding by the stream, with a strong current or tide setting exactly northeast, or directly opposite to the captain's theory. As soon as Mr. Marble had ascertained this fact, I overheard him grumbling about something, of which 1 could distinctly understand nothing but the words "infernal cape—rascally current." CHAP. V. They hurried us aboard a bark ; Bnre us some leagues to sea ; where they prepared A rotten carcass of a boat, not rigg'd, Nor tackle. sail, nor mast: the very rats Instinctively had girt us. Tempctt. The hour which succeeded in the calm of expectation, was one of the most disquieting of my life. As soon as the ship was secured, and there no longer remained anything to do, the stillness of death reigned among us; the faculties of every man and boy appearing to be absorbed in the single sense of hearing — the best, and indeed the only, means we then possessed of judging of our situation. It was now apparent that we were near some place where the surf was breaking on land; and the hollow, not-to-be-mistaken bellowings of the element, too plainly indicated that cavities in rocks frequently received, and as often rejected, the washing waters. Nor did these portentous sounds c...« less