the Minnie B fought for her last gasp of life. For several minutes she lay thus, on her side, every detail clearly delineated as liquid fire roared down her open hatches. At last, as she filled with water, the schooner straightened with a mighty effort, a last stand between sea and sky, then sank slowly out of sight in a scene of wild and ill-starred beauty. Her mainpeak disappeared in a shining maelstrom. The convulsed water flashed and hissed, and the circling waves here torches into the dead seaweed and moved the black fields to a whispered sighing.
Toward the south the waves moved with great velocity and brilliance. Indeed something seemed to be rushing away from the wreck, clad in long winding sheets of flame. It might have been a continuation of the waves in that direction, or it might have been some dolphin or shark flying from the roaring vessel.
In ghastly mystification, the two watchers stared at the last weird gleams that marked the foundered schooner. The waves reached the dinghy, raised it and dropped it with a slow gurgling, then died away in firefly glimmers. The sea presented once more a dim gray sur-
