All of a sudden there came a sheet of lightning
that showed up the whole tumbling sea for miles and miles. We sort of
ducked, expecting an awful crash of thunder, but it didn't come. There
was no sound except the big waves pounding against our sides. There
wasn't a breath of wind.
"Well, sir, at that minute there began the most exciting time I've ever
been through, and I've been on every sea on the map for twenty-five
years. Every second there'd be waves 15 or 20 feet high, belting us
head-on, stern-on and broadside, all at once. We could see them coming,
for without any stop at all flash after flash of lightning was blazing
all about us.
"Something else we could see, too. Sharks! There were hundreds of them
on all sides, jumping up and down in the water. Some of them jumped
clear out of it. And sea birds! A flock of them, squawking and crying,
made for our rigging and perched there. They seemed like they were
scared to death. But the queerest part of it all was the water itself.
It was hot--not so hot that our feet could not stand it when it washed
over the deck, but hot enough to make us think that it had been heated
by some kind of a fire.
"Well that sort of thing went on hour after hour. The waves, the
lightning, the hot water and the sharks, and all the rest of the odd
things happening, frightened the crew out of their wits. Some of them
prayed out loud--I guess the first time they ever did in their lives.
Some Frenchmen aboard kept running around and yelling, 'Cest le dernier
jour!' (This is the last day.
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