The party from Glengael, who had, as we have described, been obliged to
take refuge from the wind in the lee of the rocks, stood contemplating
the scene in silence. The sky was without a cloud--but the atmosphere
was nevertheless almost like steam, through which the sun shone so
sickly, that, even without hearing the hiss of the wind, or the rage
of the ocean, no shelter could have prevented the spectator from being
sensible that some extraordinary violence agitated and troubled the
whole air. Every shrub and bramble not only bent before the wind, but
it may be said their branches literally streamed in the blast. There
was a torrent which ran towards the sea, near the spot where the party
stood; but the wind caught its waters as they fell in a cataract, and
blew them over the face of the hill like a wreath of mist. A few birch
trees, that skirted the dell through which this stream ran, brushed the
ground before the breeze; and the silver lining of their leaves was
so upturned in the constant current of the storm, that they had the
appearance of being covered with hoar frost. Not a bee was abroad on
the heath, and the sea birds were fluttering and cowering in the lee
of the rocks--a bernacle, that attempted to fly from behind a block
of granite, was whirled screaming away in the wind, and flung with
such resistless impetuosity against the precipice, behind a corner
of which the party were sheltering, that it was killed on the spot.
The landscape was bright in the hazy sunshine; but the sheep lay in
the hollows of the ground, unable to withstand the deluge of the dry
tempest that swept all before it, and a wild and lonely lifelessness
reigned on the mountains.
The appearance of the sea was awful. It was not because the waves
rolled in more tremendous volumes than any of the party had ever before
seen, and burst against the iron precipices of Noss-head with the roar
and the rage of the falls of Niagara--the whole expanse of the ocean
was enveloped with spindrift, and, as it occasionally opened, a vessel
was seen. At first it was thought she was steering for the bay of Wick,
but it soon appeared that she drifted at random towards Sinclair’s Bay,
and could, by nothing less than some miraculous change of the wind,
reach the anchorage opposite to Kiess Castle.
Ellen Frazer was the first who spoke of the sloop’s inevitable
fate.--‘It is dreadful,’ said she, ‘for us to stand in safety here,
like spectators at a tragedy, and see yon unfortunate bark rushing
without hope to destruction. Let us make an attempt to reach the
beach--she may be driven on the shore, and we may have it in our power
to assist the poor wretches, if any should escape.’
They, accordingly, endeavoured to reach the strand; but before they
could wrestle with the wind half-way towards it, they saw that the
vessel could not attain Sinclair’s Bay, and that her only chance of
salvation was in weathering Noss-head, to which she was fast nearing.
They, in consequence, changed their course, and went towards the
promontory; but, by the time they had gained the height, they saw it
was hopeless to think they could render any assistance, and they halted
under the ledge of an overhanging rock, to see if she would be able to
weather that dreadful headland.
The place where they took shelter was to the windward of the spray,
which rose like a furious cataract against the promontory; and in
pyramids of foam, that were seen many leagues off at sea, deluged the
land to a great extent far beyond Castle Girnigo. It happened that
Ellen Frazer had a small telescope in her hand, which they had brought
with them, and, when they were under cover, she applied it to her eye.
‘The sailors,’ said she, ‘seem to have abandoned themselves to
despair--I see two prostrate on the deck. There is one standing on
the shrouds, as if he hopes to be able to leap on the rocks when she
strikes. The dog is on the end of the bowsprit--I can look at them no
more.’
She then handed the telescope to Mary, and, retiring to a little
distance, seated herself on a stone, and, covering her face with her
handkerchief, could no longer control her tears. The vessel, in the
meantime, was fast drifting towards the rocks, with her broadside to
the wave.
‘I think,’ said Mary, ‘that she must have lost her helm; nobody is
near where it should be.--They have no hope.--One of the men, who
had thrown himself on the deck, is risen. He is tying himself to the
shrouds.--There is a boy at the foot of the mast, sitting cowering on
the deck, holding his head between his hands.’
Walkinshaw, without speaking, took the telescope from his sister, who
went and sat down in silence beside Ellen. By this time, the vessel had
drifted so near, that everything on her deck was distinct to the naked
eye.
‘The person on the deck,’ said Walkinshaw, after looking through the
glass about the space of a minute, ‘is not a sailor--he has long
clothes, and has the appearance of a gentleman, probably a passenger.
That poor little boy!--he is evidently covering his ears, as if he
could shut out the noise of the roaring death that awaits him. What a
brave and noble fellow that is on the shrouds,--if coolness and courage
can save, he is safe.’
At this moment, a shriek from Mary roused Ellen, and they both ran to
the spot where Walkinshaw was standing. A tremendous wave had covered
the vessel, as it were, with a winding-sheet of foam, and before
it cleared away, she was among the breakers that raged against the
headland.
‘She is gone!’ said Walkinshaw, and he took his sister and Ellen by the
hands.--‘Let us leave these horrors.’ But the ladies trembled so much,
that they were unable to walk; and Ellen became so faint, that she was
obliged to sit down on the ground, while her lover ran with his hat
to find, if possible, a little fresh water to revive her. He had not,
however, been absent many minutes, when another shriek from his sister
called him back, and, on returning, he found that a large dog, dripping
wet, and whimpering and moaning, had laid himself at the feet of the
ladies with a look of the most piteous and helpless expression. It was
the dog they had seen on the bowsprit of the vessel, and they had no
doubt her fate was consummated; but three successive enormous billows
coming, with all the force of the German Ocean, from the Baltic, rolled
into the bay. The roar with which they broke as they hurled by the
cliff, where the party were standing, drew the attention of Walkinshaw
even from Ellen; and, to his surprise, he saw that the waves had, in
their sweep, drawn the vessel into the bay, and that she was coming
driving along the side of the precipice, and, if not dashed in pieces
before, would pass within a few yards of where they stood. Her bowsprit
was carried away, which showed how narrowly she had already escaped
destruction.
The ladies, roused again into eager and anxious sympathy by this
new incident, approached with Walkinshaw as near as possible to the
brink of the cliff--to the very edge of which the raging waters
raised their foamy crests as they passed in their might and majesty
from the headland into the bay. Another awful wave was soon after
seen rising at a distance, and, as it came rolling onward nearer and
nearer, it swallowed up every lesser billow. When it approached the
vessel, it swept her along so closely to the rocks that Walkinshaw
shouted unconsciously, and the dog ran barking to the edge of the
precipice,--all on board were for a moment animated with fresh
energy,--the little boy stood erect; and the sailor on the shrouds,
seeing Walkinshaw and the ladies, cried bravely, as the vessel rose on
the swell in passing, ‘It will not do yet.’ But the attention of his
admiring spectators was suddenly drawn from him to the gentleman. ‘Good
Heavens!’ exclaimed Ellen Frazer, ‘it is your uncle!’
It was even so. Mr. Walkinshaw, on raising his head to look up, saw
and recognized them, and, wildly starting from the deck, shook his
uplifted hands with a hideous and terrific frenzy. This scene was,
however, but for an instant; the flank of the wave, as it bore the
vessel along, broke against a projecting rock, and she was wheeled away
by the revulsion to a great distance.
The sailor in the shrouds still stood firm; a second wave, more
appalling than the former, brought the vessel again towards the cliff.
The dog, anticipating what would happen, ran towards the spot where
she was likely to strike. The surge swung her almost to the top of the
precipice,--the sailor leapt from the shrouds, and caught hold of a
projecting rock,--the dog seized him by the jacket to assist him up,
but the ravenous sea was not to lose its prey.--In the same moment
the wave broke, and the vessel was again tossed away from the rock,
and a frightful dash of the breakers tore down the sailor and the
faithful dog. Another tremendous revulsion, almost in the same moment,
terminated the fate of the vessel. As it came roaring along it caught
her by the broadside, and dashed her into ten thousand shivers against
an angle of the promontory, scarcely more than two hundred yards from
the spot where the horror-struck spectators stood. Had she been made of
glass, her destruction and fragments could not have been greater. They
floated like chaff on the waters; and, for the space of four or five
seconds, the foam amidst which they weltered was coloured in several
places with blood.