This tiny panel takes up the pictorial theme of shipping off a rocky coast in rough weather. Five vessels are shown sailing across large, rolling waves, four of them in the far background close to the horizon and one in the centre of the composition. Seagulls are following this ship, which, like the others, is under reduced sail suitable to the conditions. To the left, cliffs rising out of the waves are crowned with trees bending to the off-shore wind. In fact, unlike frequent treatments of the subject, the ships are not in specific danger. Even the sea creature raising its head out of the vast foreground waves does not pose any real threat to the sailors. Verbeeck would have been aware of the work of artists such as Vroom and Porcellis, who in their marine paintings around this time moved away from the colourful, documentary style of the Flemish tradition to a more tonal, atmospheric rendering of the natural setting.