When heavy cannons, carrying balls of twenty-four pounds, are raised from their carriages, one may imagine what would become of a ship which has no other point of support than an unsteady sea?
And meanwhile, it is to its mobility alone that she may owe her salvation.
She yields to the wind, and, provided she is strongly built, she is in a condition to brave the most violent surges.

That was the case with the "Pilgrim." A few minutes after the top-sail had been torn in pieces, the foretop-mast stay-sail was in its turn torn off.

Dick Sand must then give up the idea of setting even a storm-jib--a small sail of strong linen, which would make the ship easier to govern.
The "Pilgrim" then ran without canvas, but the wind took effect on her hull, her masts, her rigging, and nothing more was needed to impart to her an excessive velocity.

Sometimes even she seemed to emerge from the waves, and it was to be believed that she hardly grazed them.

Under these circumstances, the rolling of the ship, tossed about on the enormous billows raised by the tempest, was frightful.