"So come along, we will try it." He took Lulu's hand, and the three wended their way southward along Sunset Heights, greatly enjoying the sight of the ocean, its waves glittering and dancing in the brilliant sunlight, their booming sound as they broke along the beach and the exhilarating breeze blowing fresh and pure from them.
"This is a very dangerous coast," the captain remarked, "especially in winter, when it is visited by fierce gales; a great many vessels have been wrecked on Nantucket coast." "Yes, papa," said Max; "I heard a story the other day of a ship that was wrecked the night before Christmas, eight or ten years ago, on this shore.

Nobody knew that a ship was near until the next morning, when pieces of wreck, floating barrels, and dead bodies were cast up on the beach.
"They found that one man had got to land alive; they knew it because he was quite a distance from the beach, though entirely dead when they found him.

You see there was just one farmhouse in sight from the scene of the disaster, and they had alight that night because somebody was sick; and they supposed the man saw the light and tried to reach it, but was too much exhausted by fatigue and the dreadful cold, for it seemed his clothes had all been torn off him by the waves; he was stark naked when found, and lying on the ground, which showed that he had struggled hard to get up after falling down upon it.
"I think they said the ship was called the Isaac Newton, was loaded with barrels of coal-oil, and bound for Holland." "What a terrible death!" Lulu said with a shudder, and clinging more tightly to her father's hand; "every one drowned and may be half frozen for hours before they died.

Oh, papa, I wish you didn't belong to the navy, but lived all the time on land! I am so afraid your ship will be wrecked some time," she ended with a sob.
"It is not only upon the water that people die by what we call accident, daughter," the captain answered; "many horrible deaths occur on land--many to which drowning would in my opinion be far preferable.
"But you must remember that we are under God's care and protection everywhere, on land and on sea; and that if we are His children no real evil can befall us.

I am very glad you love me, my child, but I would not have you make yourself unhappy with useless fears on my account.
Trust the Lord for me and all whom you love." They pressed onward and presently came upon a lovely lakelet near the beach, as clear as crystal and with bushes with dark green foliage growing on all sides but that toward the sea.
They stopped for a moment to gaze upon it with surprise and admiration, then pushed on again till the top of the high bluff known as Tom Never's Head was reached.
They stood upon its brink and looked off westward and northward over the heaving, tumbling ocean, as far as the eye could reach to the line where sea and sky seemed to meet, taking in long draughts of the pure, invigorating air, and listening to the roar of the breakers below.
"What is that down there ?" asked Lulu.
"Part of a wreck, evidently," answered her father; "it must have been there a long while, it is so deeply imbedded in the sand." "I wish I knew its story," said Lulu; "I hope everybody wasn't drowned when it was lost." "It must have happened years ago, before that life-saving station was built," remarked Max.
"Life-saving station," repeated Lulu, turning to look in the direction of his glance; "what's that ?" "Do you not know what that means ?" asked her father.