PIGNEA IPUEOIE MONE IRIE GNIS ITCHEROE IE SISOKZUL, Sx

Jack allowed the frigate to proceed on her southerly course for an hour or
more and then tacked.

The weather began to show unmistakable signs of change; and, as he had pre-
dicted, mixed with the fog came a chilly drizzling rain, so fine as to hardly be
distinguished from the mist itself. The wind blew in light, fitful squalls, shifting
slowly to the south’ard, and the ship creaked and groaned as she rose and fell in
the long swell.

Of all on board, Jack alone was aware of the position of the ship and the
peculiar dangers which menaced her. The shoals of Nantucket are rarely
visited by mariners, and it was nothing remarkable that the officers were
entirely ignorant of the existence of the dangerous currents; even the positions
of the shoals were uncertain, for the charts of this region are untrustworthy.

To understand the situation, let us glance for a moment at the chart. Old
Man Shoal lies off the southeast corner of the island. When Jack boarded the
frigate the wind was light from the northeast and she was headed well clear of
the shoal; but the strong westerly current was drifting her directly upon it,
hence Jack’s anxiety to tack and stand to the east’ard, as on this course he could
stand on for three or four miles before encountering the very shallow water of
the line of broken reefs which extended like a belt to the northward till they
nearly met the Point Rip, jutting from the northern end of the island. The
passage between these shoals was marked by the buoy at the end of the “ Rip,”
and to get the ship out of her present dilemma this buoy must be found. Her
only salvation was through the passage; for to the westward lay the island, to
the eastward the long line of shoals, and behind her, stretching for twenty miles,
was the broken ground.

True, the ship had come in safely from that direction, but to get out was a
different matter.

Jack knew that, long before they could gain the open sea, the gale would be
upon them, and blowing directly ahead, and they would never be able to beat
against the wind and the heavy sea that would “raise” at once in the shoal
water. For the same reason they could not hope to ride out the gale at anchor;
no ground tackle was ever made strong enough to hold a ship in the short
angry seas that rolled over the shoals in a southeast gale.

All this Jack explained to Captain Somerset as they talked together on the
bridge.

The experience Jack had gained knocking around in all sorts of weather. in
his old cat-boat now stood him in good stead. Ordinarily the ship might have
been safely navigated by the usual methods, the log and the compass assisted by
the lead line; but in the currents lay the unknown and dangerous factor. The
salvation of the ship depended upon Jack’s local knowledge of these currents.

“It’s a fine wind now to the buoy,” he remarked to the captain as he gave
the quartermaster the course. “ We ought to make it in two hours.”