"Will we ever weather this terrible storm?" It was a half-grown lad who flung this despairing question out; the wind carried the sound of his voice off over the billows; but there came no answer. A brigantine, battered by the tropical hurricane sweeping up from the Caribbean Sea, was staggering along like a wounded beast. Her masts had long since gone by the board, and upon the stump of the mizzen-stick a bit of canvas like a goose-wing had been spread in the useless endeavor to maintain steerageway.