We had come through so much.

We had escaped so many perils; so very much depended on our winning through to Sercq; and failure at this last moment would be so heart-breaking.

Yes, my heart boiled with unspoken prayers and strange vows, which I fear were somewhat in the nature of bargainings,--future conduct for present aid,--but which did not seem to me out of place at the moment, and which, in any case, did me no harm, for a man works better on prayers than on curses, I'll be bound.
Sercq at last grew large in front of us, and our hearts were high.

When we jerked our heads over our shoulders we could see the long green slopes of the Eperquerie beckoning us on, and the rugged brown crests of the Grande and Petite Moies bobbing cheerfully above the tumbling waves, and Le Tas on the other side standing like a monument of Sercq's unconquerable stubbornness.
And these things spoke to us, and called to us, and braced us with hope, though our flanks clapped together with the strain of that long pull, and our legs trembled, and our hands were cramped and blistered.
Then, of a sudden, Le Marchant jerked a cry, and I saw what he saw--the topsail of a schooner rising white in the sun above the sky-line, and to our hearts there was menace in the very look of it.
We looked round at Sercq, at the cracks in the headlands, and the green slopes smiling in the sunshine, and the white tongues of the waves as they leaped up the cliffs.
"Five miles!" gasped Le Marchant.
"She must be twelve or more.

We'll do it." "Close work!" And we bent and rowed as we had never rowed in our lives before.
The schooner had evidently all the wind she wanted.