Her condition was one of extreme danger, and the captain was by no means
sure that he could make the land. If a storm or a heavy sea came on, they
were doomed.
As it was, with all hands at the pumps the water gained on her, and she
moaned and creaked and ached her way into the night with no surety that
she would show a funnel to the light of another day. Passengers and crew
alike worked, and the few boats were got ready to lower away when the
worst should come to the worst. Below, with the crew, the little
moneymaster of St. Saviour's worked with an energy which had behind it
some generations of hardy qualities; and all the time he refused to be
downcast. There was something in his nature or in his philosophy after
all. He had not much of a voice, but it was lusty and full of good
feeling; and when cursing began, when a sailor even dared to curse his
baptism--the crime of crimes to a Catholic mind--Jean Jacques began to
sing a cheery song with which the habitants make vocal their labours or
their playtimes:
"A Saint-Malo, beau port de mer,
Trois gros navir's sont arrives,
Trois gros navir's sont arrives
Charges d'avoin', charges de ble.
Charges d'avoin', charges de ble:
Trois dam's s'en vont les marchander."
And so on through many verses, with a heartiness that was a good antidote
to melancholy, even though it was no specific for a shipwreck.
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