Milly's Errand by Emma Leslie

JACK and his brother were soon fast asleep, in spite of the noise made by the wind. But the widow lay listening to its wild roar, and thinking of that night when her husband was out in just such a storm as this, that came on so suddenly that before he could reach the shore his little fishing boat was dashed on the fatal rocks, and he and three others perished in the eddying waves.

As the hours went on, the storm increased in violence, while ever and anon between the lulls of the tempest the guns of a vessel in distress could be plainly heard. At the earliest dawn, all the men in the village were down upon the beach; some had been there all night watching the ineffectual effort of the splendid vessel to gain the harbor. It was all in vain, she was drifting fast to her doom on the fatal reef of hidden rocks that made this coast so dangerous.