VALENTINE'S MANUAL

savage noise as the ribbons snapped like a hundred whips.
Every man was on deck. The Captain shouted through
his trumpet for volunteers to go aloft to take in the
upper topsails. Two of these went with a noise like an
explosion before the sailors could furl them. The sight
of the volunteers going up the rigging with their knives
in their mouths was great. Almost immediately the squall
turned into a gale, the sea ran high. Fortunately it was
astern. Under close reef we were making good time.
The squall having struck us before the daily observation,
the Captain put out a patent revolving log to estimate the
run in miles, but some sea creature mistook it for food
and chewed up the mechanism, and when it was taken in,
it was a wreck. We therefore had no reckoning and no
sun to take an observation. We were rapidly nearing
Cape Clear. For two days and two nights we plunged
along with the gale astern. Early in the morning, the
third day, I rushed on deck half dressed, to answer the
Captain's call for all hands on deck. We had passed
Cape Clear, were apparently driving into a bay on the
east coast of Ireland, about fifty miles northeast of the
Cape, as we afterwards discovered, having completely
lost our reckoning. The breakers were right ahead, but
the Captain put that ship about. The masts fairly
shook under the sudden strain. The excitement was
great. Everyone pulled his best on the ropes and when
the last one was belayed fast we saw the breakers astern.
Our altered, course brought us out into the Irish Sea.
We passed Holly Head in the moonlight that night and
reached Liverpool the next day. The voyage took
twenty-three days. It was a unique and never to be
forgotten experience, but I have always maintained that
the Iceland voyage would have been less risky.

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