Probably he knew that there was no danger.

He was accustomed to storms, and rather enjoyed them than otherwise.

His lectures on the Elizabethan heroes of the sea had a fascination for young Englishmen which no historical discourses ever surpassed.
These sea-tales were spread over a year, being delivered in the Easter Terms of 1893 and 1894.

Before they were finished Froude had begun another course on the life and correspondence of Erasmus.
Erasmus is one of the choicest names in the history of letters, the flower of the religious Renaissance.

Simply and sincerely pious, he enjoyed without abusing all the pleasures of life, wrote such Latin prose as had not been known since Pliny, and learnt Greek that he might understand the true meaning of the New Testament.