Fathom after fathom the Iroquois followed the rising tide shoreward. When the lead showed questionable depths, the anchor-chain was made fast,and the little cutter paused for a while in her progress, marking time, as it were, to the music of the storm. With unwonted rapidity the tide mounted up, and Captain Hardwick followed it as fast and as far as he dared.
Plainly there was a good chance to save the Capitol City. As the two ships came closer, every detail of the stranded ship was visible. She had suffered astonishingly little, when the violence of the storm was considered. She lay almost on an even keel. Though not pointing directly to the waves, the stern was so nearly in line with them that they were parted as they reached her, sweeping past with little damage to her hull. A section of her taffrail was gone, and a part of her rudder was broken off. Otherwise she appeared to have suffered little, and the success of the pumps in keeping down the water in the hold showed that even her plates had not been badly started. Her superstructure had suffered little. One of her small boats had been washed away, but otherwise she seemed to the watchers on the Iroquois to be in remarkably good condition.
What was more important, her crew was intact. Huddled high on the bridge and in the