Presently, having finished praying, the admiral addressed them in a consoling speech; and then, their courage being much raised, all bestirred themselves to regard the position.
The pumps were first tried and the ship freed of water, and to their great joy they found that the leakage was no greater than before, and that the rocks had not penetrated through the planks.
This appeared to all on board to be an absolute miracle, wrought in their favor; for it seemed impossible to them that, running at so high a rate of speed, the vessel could have failed to break herself against the rocks.

It is probable that, in fact, the ship had struck upon a newly-formed coral reef; and that the coral--which, when first made, is not very hard--had crashed to pieces under the shock, and so she lay in safety upon the bed of pounded fragments..