Yet we will play the
man, and make a fight for life.' And then, as if gathering together all
his force: 'We have weathered bad times together, and who knows but we
shall weather this?'
The other prisoners were on deck now, and had found their way aft. They
were wild with fear, being landsmen and never having seen an angry sea,
and indeed that sea might have frighted sailors too. So they stumbled
along drenched with the waves, and clustered round Elzevir, for they
looked on him as a leader, because he knew the ways of the sea and was
the only one left calm in this dreadful strait.
It was plain that when the Dutch crew found they were embayed, and that
the ship must drift into the breakers, they had taken to the boats, for
gig and jolly-boat were gone and only the pinnace left amidships. 'Twas
too heavy a boat perhaps for them to have got out in such a fearful sea;
but there it lay, and it was to that the prisoners turned their eyes.
Some had hold of Elzevir's arms, some fell upon the deck and caught him
by the knees, beseeching him to show them how to get the pinnace out.
Then he spoke out, shouting to make them hear: 'Friends, any man that
takes to boat is lost. I know this bay and know this beach, and was
indeed born hereabouts, but never knew a boat come to land in such a sea,
save bottom uppermost.
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