[Mod-xml-general] him clean between the eyes, tumbling him backwards, as if he had been sh

[Demedeiros <id...@ka...>]

On our mast. "What does it mean?" "It's the Chinese word for a `big
wind,' my boy," said he kindly; but looking very grave. "You'll soon be
able to see what it's like for yourself." The opportunity he spoke of
was not long delayed. By the time the sails had been taken in and all
our preparations made for the reception of our expected but unwelcome
visitor, everything being lashed down that was likely to get blown away,
and life-lines rove along the deck fore and aft, the same as when we
were making ready to weather the Cape of Good Hope, it was late in the
afternoon. At four o'clock, the commencement of the first dog-watch, the
barometer had fallen further down the scale to 29.46; while, an hour
later, it was down to 28.96, the wind increasing in force almost every
minute and the sea growing in proportion, until the very height of the
cyclone was attained. The dinghy, which was lashed inboard behind the
wheel-house, was blown bodily away to leeward, the ropes holding it
parting as if they had been pack-thread, heavy squalls, accompanied with
heavy rain all the time beating on us like hail, and bursting over the
ship in rapid succession; but the old barquey bravely stood it, bending
to the blast when it came, and then buoyantly rising the next moment and
breasting it like the good sea-boat she was. At "six bells" the
barometer fell to its lowest point, 28.60, when the violence of the wind
was something fearful, although after this there was a slight rise in
the glass. During the next half-hour, however, the mizzen-topsail, which
Tom Jerrold and I, with Gregory to help us, had fastened as we thought
so firmly to the yard, was blown to ribbons, the spanker getting adrift
shortly afterwards and being torn away from its lacing to the lu