and the white coral was visible but a few feet beneath our keel. Here the sea became dangerously steep; there were rollers such as one sees on the weather edge of the Doggerbank in an autumn gale. The water poured over our sides in alarming volumes; the men at the baling apparatus could not keep it under; the loose sand that formed our ballast was converted into sludge, and shifted with each roll of the vessel. We were certainly, for a short time, in some danger of foundering; and this the skipper realised, for, shouting orders mingled with invocations to Allah and the Prophet, he promptly hauled his wind and made for the open sea and deeper water.
The skipper pressed the dhow under as much canvas as she could safely carry, and we had a few accidents on the way. First we sprang our heavy foreyard at the juncture of the two spars of which it was formed; so the sail was lowered and we ran on more comfortably, but at a much reduced rate, under the smaller mizzen, which had not yet been set, and which was now brought forward and hoisted on the foremast. Next, with a loud report, the sheet carried away in a squall, and the sail was split in various places before it could be secured and got down. We had now, therefore, to run under bare poles for a short time, until the foresail-yard was repaired. This was done very smartly—for Arab sailors have plenty of practice in patching up their invariably rickety spars and gear—up went our big foresail
