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184 casks were shifted. Then the ship's carpenter and an assistant went to work to tighten up the seams, through which the water of the ocean was spurting furiously. It was a difficult and dangerous task, and it lasted the best part of three hours. But, at last, the workers got the better of the elements, and then the water went down steadily in the ship's well, as the men at the pumps continued their labors.

"Will the ship pull through?" asked Phil, of the captain.

"Yes, my lad, I think we are safe now—unless the blow makes us open some more seams."

After the repairs below had been made and the alarm had passed, Captain Marshall called the first mate to his side.

"I thought you said those seams were all right when we were at the dock at San Francisco," he began.

"They looked all right," mumbled Paul Shepley.

"You couldn't have examined them very closely."

"I did."

"Humph! After this I had better look to things myself," was the captain's comment, and he moved away.

A little later the supercargo and the first mate met in the waist. The storm was now dying down rapidly, and it looked as if the sun would soon break through the clouds.