WE have, on a previous page, given an account of the loss of valuable lives occasioned by an accident to a life-boat. The following is an interesting'and affecting narrative of the loss of a valuable life, illustrative of another phase of that danger which is almost inseparable from the work of affording succour to the shipwrecked:— " No heavier surf rolls upon Great Britain, nor is there a more inhospitable shore than that from Hartland, westwards. The day before yesterday I was standing at sunset on the breakwater of Bude.

The waves were dashing heavily on the rocks. A noble life-boat belonging to the NATIONAL LIFEBOAT INSTITUTION had just been successfully exercising her powers against the upright walls of water. The crowd that had watched her were dispersing, when a small schooner and a sloop in the offing showed signs of approach. The dangersignal was hoisted. The wind off shore made entrance in such a sea impossible. ' By heaven !' said the harbour-master, ' the sloop is coming in.

In an hour Capt. BROWN will be drowned.' Inside the breakers lay the " Hobbler's" boat, unable to approach. In creeps the sloop till her sails shake in the wind. She drives now slowly to the northwards.

The sun is down. We just see her rise on the surf, then heel over, then fall on her broadside, under the opposite cliff. Roller after roller tumbles in heavily; now she rises, and then dashes down into the foam. We, who have watched with pride the life-boat, felt a sore aching as we saw the little 60-ton sloop doomed. The two sturdy fellows who, for an honest but painful livelihood unceasingly navigate these rude seas in their rickety craft, seem to deserve another fate. The life-boat cannot approach the reef. ' A rocket might save them !' It is a mile round the bay to the opposite cliff. Away run the crowd. HOYLE, chief boatman of Coastguard, is not yet out of the life-boat, of which he is Coxswain. 'He jumps ashore. A cart is soon at the station-house; tie rockets and their apparatus are put in; the crowd follow as you of London might follow a fireengine.

We reached the cliff. It is now dark.

From the surf, in the recoil of the wave beneath the cliff, here some 70 feet high, BROWN cheerily answers ' Ay, Ay;' and is then submerged under the next breaker. Will she hold an hour as she crunches against the rocks? We lie down or strain over the rickety edge. 'Keep back," say the knowing ones, 'lest the cliff give way!' Away flies the rocket, lighting up the caldron below.

The captain and his mates are clinging to the masthead. ' Have you the line ?' is shouted.

Cheerily, but yet more faint,' Ay, Ay,' reaches our straining ears. The block is fixed. The hawser is hauled out; a few more anxious moments, and HOTLE and his chief mate DAINGHER cry again, ' Stand back!' and BROWN is lifted over the cliff.

We feel, for we cannot see, the dripping, battered, cheery little fellow, who, after shaking like an old Newfoundland dog, rushes to the cliff edge, to help in hauling up his mate, JOE, of Clovelly. The excited crowd gives half-choking hurrahs, and retires inland. Scarce one hour from the ill-fated entry of the sloop has completed all. In the morning, at daylight, most of us return to see washing away by the incoming tide the shivered timbers of the luckless sloop. BROWN, the industrious and ruined seaman, is there too, and takes a last look at all his hard-earned savings: his life only spared, he must begin all again. So might have ended my tale of a Cornish wreck in '61. But 'One is taken and another left.' To the skill and the alacrity of HOYLE, DAINGHER, and their men, acting in obedience to the excellent instructions of the BOARD OF TRADE, the result was due. But DAINGHER is out all night, no doubt on duty; in the morning he is not seen, and at noon his body is found at the haven mouth. Returning home he fell over the cliff. Whether he had a family I know not. The man appeared to be an intrepid, sterling seaman. He dies unseen in this remote spot, but at his post."—From the Times.