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WHAT CAME IN A NORTH SEA FOG.
Night saw our ship off Orfordness, and there the breeze failed us, and a thick fog, hiding the land and its lights, crept up from seaward and wrapped us round.

But before it came, on Orfordness a fire burnt redly, though what it was, unless it might be some fisher's beacon, we could not tell.
The fog lifted as we drifted past the wide mouth of Stour and Orwell rivers with a little breeze, and the early daylight showed us the smoke of a fire that burnt on the higher land that shuts in the haven's mouth on its southern shores.

But even as we saw it, the fog closed round us again and the wind died away, so that we lowered the sail, and the men got out the oars, and slowly, while Kenulf swung the lead line constantly, we crept on among the sand banks down the coast.
Presently the tide turned against us, and Kenulf thought well that we should drop anchor and wait for its turning again.

The men gladly laid in the oars, and the anchor rattled out and held.