Another man told us how he had stood beside Nelson on the "Victory," just as the admiral received his death-wound; and it never occurred to us to wonder how a man of not more than thirty-five could have been present at that famous battle, which took place fifty years ago! But the yarn that pleased us most was the one about the wreck of the "Wolf King," when the Kingstairs lifeboat, the "Dreadnought," put out in a tremendous gale, and reached her just as she was going down, and rescued sixteen of her crew.

This story we called for over and over again, till we knew it by heart.

And many a time, as we lay awake at night, and heard the wind whistling round the house, we wondered if it was a storm like this when the "Wolf King" went down, or whether any ship would be getting on to the Sands to-night.
It was Christmas Eve--a wild, blustering night.

It had been blowing up hard for several days now, and we were used to the howling of the wind and the roar of the waves on the beach.

We had gone to bed tired and excited, for the promised hamper had arrived that afternoon, and we had been unpacking it.