Battles with the Sea

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Robert Michael Ballantyne. Battles with the Sea

Chapter One. Heroes of the Lifeboat and Rocket. Skirmishes with the Subject Generally

Chapter Two. Describes a Tremendous Battle and a Glorious Victory

Chapter Three. Light and Shade in Lifeboat Work

Chapter Four. Construction and Qualities of the Lifeboat

Chapter Five. More Tales of Heroism

Chapter Six. Supplies a few Points for Consideration

Chapter Seven. The Life-Saving Rocket

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Before following our brilliant lifeboat—this gaudy, butterfly-like thing of red, white, and blue—to the field of battle, let me observe that the boats of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution have several characteristic qualities, to which reference shall be made hereafter, and that they are of various sizes. (A full and graphic account of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution—its boats, its work, and its achievements—may be found in an interesting volume by its late secretary, Richard Lewis, Esquire, entitled History of the Lifeboat and its Work—published by Macmillan and Company.)

One of the largest size is that of Ramsgate. This may be styled a privileged boat, for it has a steam-tug to wait upon it named the Aid. Day and night the Aid has her fires “banked up” to keep her boilers simmering, so that when the emergency arises, a vigorous thrust of her giant poker brings them quickly to the boiling point, and she is ready to take her lifeboat in tow and tug her out to the famed and fatal Goodwin Sands, which lie about four miles off the coast—opposite to Ramsgate.

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The engines of the Aid are powerful, like her whole frame. Though fiercely opposed she battled out into the raging sea, now tossed on the tops of the mighty waves, now swallowed in the troughs between. Battered by the breaking crests, whelmed at times by “green seas,” staggering like a drunken thing, and buffeted by the fierce gale, but never giving way an inch, onward, steadily if slowly, until she rounded the North Foreland. Then the rescuers saw the signals going up steadily, regularly, from the two lightships. No cessation of these signals until they should be answered by signals from the shore.

All this time the lifeboat had been rushing, surging, and bounding in the wake of her steamer. The seas not only roared around her, but absolutely overwhelmed her. She was dragged violently over them, and sometimes right through them. Her crew crouched almost flat on the thwarts, and held on to prevent being washed overboard. The stout cable had to be let out to its full extent to prevent snapping, so that the mist and rain sometimes prevented her crew from seeing the steamer, while cross seas met and hurled her from side to side, causing her to plunge and kick like a wild horse.

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