She rose very rapidly.
To our anxious eyes she seemed to sweep along like a sun-gleam on a cloudy day....

Both her topsails were clear to us....

We could see her jibs swollen with venom, and past them the great sweep of her mainsails with the booms well out over the side to take the full of the wind....

The sweat poured down us, the veins stood out of us like cords....

Once, in the frenzy of my thoughts, the gleaming white sails on our quarter, and the crisp green waves alongside, and the dingy brown boat, and Le Marchant's fiery crimson neck, all shot with red for a moment, and I loosed one hand and drew it over my brow to see if it was blood or only sweat that trickled there.
On and on she came, a marvel of beauty, though she meant death for us, and showed it in every graceful venomous line, from the sharp white curl at her forefoot to the swelling menace of her sails.
Her long black hull was clear to us now, and still we had a mile to go.