The height of the poop rail from the surface of the water had by this
time grown so insignificant, by reason of the depth to which the hull of
the ship had become immersed, that upon striking the water I only
descended about a foot below the surface, ere rising again; while my
companion was so effectually supported by the lifebuoy that she remained
quite dry above the shoulders. The water was not at all cold, indeed it
was of quite a pleasant temperature, so I anticipated no discomfort on
that account, either for my companion or myself. Now--that we were
actually overboard my first anxiety was to place as great a distance as
possible between ourselves and the sinking ship, so that we might
perchance escape being dragged down by her when she should founder. I
therefore at once thrust my left arm through one of the beckets of the
lifebuoy, and struck out with all my strength away from the ship,
swimming athwart the sea, so that it might not break in our faces, and
towing my companion after me. I contrived to place a distance of about
a hundred fathoms between us and the ship before she disappeared--which
was very considerably more than I had dared to hope for when we jumped
overboard--and although this did not carry us quite clear of the vortex
created by the sinking ship, it carried us so far away that we were only
dragged back somewhat toward the centre, without being taken under. I
swam for another ten minutes, and then, deeming that we were so far
distant as to be free from all danger of injury by the rising of
floating wreckage under us, it seemed advisable to heave-to and husband
my strength a little, since I could not tell to what extent it might be
taxed in the immediate future. As to my companion, she was put to no
exertion whatever, the lifebuoy supporting her perfectly; and when I
inquired as to her welfare she informed me that she felt quite as
comfortable and as much at ease as could be reasonably expected under
the circumstances.
I allowed a quarter of an hour--as nearly as I could guess it--to elapse
after the disappearance of the ship; and then, believing that whatever
wreckage was likely to float up from her to the surface would already
have done so, I thought we might safely return to the scene of the
catastrophe, since it was upon the existence of a certain amount of
floating wreckage that I built such slight hope as I entertained of our
ultimate preservation. I knew pretty exactly the bearings of the spot
where the ship had gone down--having taken them by the moon--and, thus
guided, I struck out over the way that we had recently travelled, towing
Miss Onslow after me; and as I swam I could not help a feeling of
surprise at the height of the sea, which seemed mountainous, now that we
were down upon its surface, although from the deck of the ship it had
appeared nothing at all extraordinary. I had been swimming some five
minutes or so when, as we floated up on the breast of a wave, I saw in
the dim moonlight what looked like a quantity of loose, floating
wreckage at no very great distance away, but slightly to windward; and
toward this we made the best of our way, ultimately arriving in the
midst of a quantity of loose, jagged, and splintered planking tangled up
with a raffle of spars, sails, and rigging. It was rather dangerous
stuff to venture among, as some of the loose planks were lancing about
in the wash of the sea with considerable violence, and a blow from a
jagged end would have inflicted a more or less serious injury, even had
it not killed us outright; but at length I found a little clear space
among the wreckage, into which I towed my companion, and presently we
found ourselves close alongside one of the masts, with the after-rim of
the top riding dry; and on to this I at once climbed, hauling Miss
Onslow after me, and lashing her securely to the top by means of an end
of rope cut from among the raffle. Here we were reasonably safe and
comfortable, for we were upon a raft of buoyant material that would
probably float for months, while there was so much of it that it
effectually broke the sea and prevented it from washing over us. It was
a terrible situation for such a delicately-nurtured girl as she who had
so unexpectedly been thrown under my protecting care; but throughout the
night she never uttered a single word that could be construed into
complaint; nor did she evince the slightest fear; on the contrary, she
exhibited a calm and steadfast courage that filled me with admiration,
although the questions that she put to me from time to time rendered it
perfectly clear that she very fully realised the desperate nature of our
predicament.
Some time during the night--it would probably be about midnight--the
wind dropped to a light breeze, and the sea began to go down, until by
daylight there was only a very gentle air blowing, with very little sea,
but a long, heavy swell; the clouds all went drifting away out of sight,
leaving the sky clear; and there was, generally, a very promising
prospect that the coming day would be fine.
The moment that it was light enough to see, I scrambled up on the
wreckage and took a long look round, in the hope of descrying a sail,
but the horizon was bare. Then, as the light grew stronger, I proceeded
to minutely inspect the mass of wreckage that had afforded us shelter
throughout the night, with the view of ascertaining its capabilities as
a refuge for a more or less lengthy period--until, in fact, we were
either taken off by a passing ship, or perished of starvation. There
seemed to be a great deal of it--much more than I could satisfactorily
account for--but as the dawn spread and brightened, and objects grew
increasingly distinct, everything became intelligible, even to the cause
of the catastrophe that had so suddenly and terribly hurled us from a
situation of safety and comfort into one of the direst peril and
uncertainty. For I found that while my companion and I were clinging to
the wreckage of the ill-fated _City of Cawnpore's_ mainmast--the whole
of which had somehow come adrift from the hull--we were surrounded by
and tangled up with a large quantity of planking and woodwork, some of
which we recognised as having belonged to our own ship, while the
remainder resolved itself into the shattered hull of a large,
timber-laden, wooden ship which had been cut nearly half through by the
tremendous impact of our own vessel upon it when she struck it and so
destroyed herself in the darkness of the preceding night. A minute
inspection of this wreck enabled me to clearly understand exactly what
had happened: the stranger had been dismasted--for her spars were still
attached to her hull--and had, at the same time, or subsequently, become
water-logged to such an extent as to submerge her hull nearly to the
level of the deck; her crew had abandoned her; and she had been left
washing about, a scarcely visible yet truly formidable death-trap, for
our own good ship to blunder upon to her destruction. The force of the
blow had turned the stranger nearly bottom up, so I could not even make
a guess at her nationality, and, worse still, it had robbed us of a
possible chance of slightly bettering our condition by taking up our
quarters aboard her.
In addition to the mass that my hapless companion and I had taken refuge
upon there were a few small quantities of detached wreckage floating
here and there within a radius of about a quarter of a mile, and among
these I by and by noticed something that looked so much like a capsized
boat that--as there seemed to be no sharks about--I determined to swim
out and examine it. I mentioned my resolution to Miss Onslow, who made
no demur whatever to being left alone for a time, merely remarking, with
a somewhat wan smile:
"If it should by good fortune prove to be a boat, please do not, in your
elation, sail away, forgetting that you have left me behind."
I assured her that she might absolutely depend upon my never forgetting
that I had undertaken to save her, and therewith plunged into the warm
sea.
Swimming a long, steady stroke, it did not take me very long to reach
the object for which I was aiming, and which proved, as I had
conjectured, to be a ship's boat, swamped, and floating keel up. And
not only so, but when I got alongside her I was delighted to find that
she was one of the _City of Cawnpore's_ quarter boats--no doubt the one
that the miners had cut partially adrift ere the ship went down--the
especial significance and importance of this discovery arising from the
fact that poor Dacre had made a point of having every item of each
boat's equipment stowed within her, and properly secured; so that,
unless something very untoward had happened, it was reasonable to hope
that I should find this craft thus furnished. And, sure enough, she
appeared to be so, when I at length managed to right her, for, as she
rolled over, I caught sight of the oars, masts, and sails--the latter
neatly encased in canvas coats--all securely lashed to the thwarts.
Without waiting to further investigate, I got hold of her by the stern
and, hanging on by one hand, proceeded to scoop the water out of her
with the other. This was a long job, considerably more than an hour
being spent in removing the comparatively small quantity of water
necessary to enable me to get into her; but, once in her, I made much
better progress, using my two hands to throw the water out, until--
having got rid of sufficient to enable me to move about without again
filling the boat--I managed to find a baler, when I made short work of
baling her dry. This done, I took stock of my prize, and found that I
had come into possession of a twenty-eight-foot gig, in a perfectly
sound and undamaged condition, equipped with four sixteen-foot ash oars,
a mast and sails, rowlocks, bottom-boards, stretchers, rudder and yoke,
baler, boat-hook, and--priceless treasure, under the circumstances--two
breakers of fresh water securely lashed to the bottom-boards to serve as
ballast. With such a prize as this what might not be possible? With a
thankful heart I cast adrift the oars, shipped a pair, and--standing up
fisherman fashion, with my face toward the bow--paddled the boat to the
pile of wreckage whereon I had left Miss Onslow.
The sea had by this time gone down to such an extent that I had no
difficulty in putting the boat alongside the wreckage, taking the young
lady on board, and shoving clear again without damaging the boat in the
least. My clothes were by this time quite dry, and those of my
companion nearly so; we were therefore, comparatively speaking,
comfortable, excepting that we were both sensible of the possession of a
most healthy and hearty appetite, which we had no means of satisfying.
A casual remark by Miss Onslow upon this unpleasant feature of our
adventure set me thinking, with the result that before leaving our mass
of wreckage for good, I secured the signal halliards--to serve as a
fishing-line--together with a fair supply of other small cordage, the
main-royal--which I cut away from the wreckage to serve as a sort of
tent, to shelter my companion from the dew at night-time--and a small
spike nail or two, which, with considerable labour, I cut out of the
planking of the derelict that had brought disaster upon us. These last
I secured with the rather hazy idea that it might be possible for me to
file them down and convert them into fish-hooks with the aid of a small
file that formed one of the implements in my pocket-knife. Thus
provided, I shipped the boat's rudder and yoke, stepped the mast, set
the sails, and shoved off, my intention being to shape a course--as
nearly as I could hit it off--for Cape Town, in the hope that ere long
we might be fallen in with and picked up by some craft bound thither.
The boat, however, had scarcely begun to gather way when I espied, at no
very great distance, what I took to be a floating hencoop; and realising
that, if my conjecture happened to be correct, the coop would probably
be found to contain drowned poultry that, in our desperate situation,
would serve for food, I headed the boat for it. My surmise again proved
to be well founded; the object turned out to be a coop, and it contained
seventeen dead fowls, the whole of which I secured. And in gaining
possession of the poultry I found it necessary to break away two or
three of the slats or bars that formed the front of the coop, thus
discovering that they were secured to the body of the coop by long,
thin, wire nails, out of which I soon satisfied myself that I could make
very promising fish-hooks by merely bending them into the requisite
shape, I secured about a dozen of these nails; and then made sail with a
fair wind upon an approximately due east course. Although the wind was
light the boat slipped through the water at a very satisfactory pace;
and in half an hour's time we had run the wreckage completely out of
sight.
During the progress of the foregoing operations my companion had been
very quiet, looking on with an air of interest at everything I did, and
occasionally volunteering her assistance where she seemed to think she
might possibly be able to make herself useful, but otherwise saying
little. Now, however, that we had once more settled down into a
condition of comparative inactivity she began to question me as to our
whereabouts, what were my intentions, and so on; all of which questions
I replied to as accurately as I could. Then, after meditating for
several minutes, she said:
"And what do you think are our chances of escape, Mr Conyers? Do you
consider that they are favourable enough to justify you in taking so
very much trouble?"
"Ah," answered I, "if you had asked me that question last night, when we
jumped overboard together from the sinking ship, I should probably have
found some difficulty in answering you at once hopefully and truthfully;
for, as a matter of fact, I may now tell you that I really had _no_
hope, and that, in acting as I did, I was merely obeying that instinct
that urges us all to fight for life so long as we have any fight left in
us. But _now_ that we have come into possession of this fine and
well-equipped boat I can honestly say that I consider our chance of
ultimate escape is excellent. Of course everything depends upon the
weather: if a gale were to spring up, the boat would probably be swamped
or capsized by the heavy sea that would quickly rise--although even
under such adverse conditions as those of a gale I should bring all my
sailorly training and knowledge to bear on the task of preserving the
boat as long as possible. But if Providence will only favour us with
fine weather for, say, a week, I have scarcely a shadow of doubt that
within that time we shall be fallen in with and picked up by a craft of
some sort. For you must understand that we are right in the track of
ships bound round the Cape; and those vessels are now so many in number
that, making a rough guess, I should be inclined to say that an average
of at least one vessel per day must pass within a few miles of this
spot. Of course it may happen that several days will pass without a
single craft of any kind coming along, but, to maintain the average, it
is equally likely that three or four may pass in the course of a dozen
hours. So you see our chance of being rescued is fairly good."
"Yes. But," she objected, "suppose it were unfortunately to happen that
several days--say seven or eight--were to elapse without our seeing a
sail; and that, afterwards, such ships as we might see were to pass us
at such a long distance that although they would be perfectly visible to
us, we should be quite invisible to them: What then?"
"In that case," said I, "there would be but one course open to us: we
should simply be obliged to keep sailing on until a ship approached us
near enough to see us, taking every care of ourselves meanwhile, and
omitting no opportunity to procure such means of supporting life as the
ocean has to offer us. And that reminds me that neither food nor drink
has passed our lips since dinner, last night: I know you are hungry,
because you said so some time ago; and, as for me, I am famishing. The
food at our disposal is not particularly inviting--simply raw chicken
and cold water--but it is at least fresh, and I think we ought to make
the most of it while it is in that condition."
Miss Onslow's appetite was not, however, as yet quite keen enough to
admit of her partaking of raw fowl; but she drank a little water out of
the baler--the only utensil we possessed. As she returned the baler to
me she remarked:
"You must not allow my squeamishness to be a bar to the satisfaction of
your own appetite, if you feel hungry enough to eat raw flesh. I have
been told that sailors are so often reduced to desperate straits that
they eventually become reconciled to the idea of eating almost anything,
and are consequently, as a rule, much less fastidious than such pampered
mortals as myself. Moreover, you must not forget that it is of the last
importance that _your_ strength should be maintained--for your own sake,
and for mine as well--if it is not too presumptuous of me to say such a
thing--therefore please make a meal, if you can. And, although I fully
realise how absolutely dependent upon you I am, I should like you to
understand that I do not mean to be a mere helpless burden to you, if it
can be avoided. I am perhaps not physically strong enough to be of much
assistance to you; but in all cases where skill rather than great bodily
strength is required I hope you will unhesitatingly make use of me. For
instance, you are hungry; but you cannot make even such slight
preparation of your food as is possible, because you are steering the
boat. Again, you will soon need rest, but you will be unable to take it
unless I am able to steer the boat in your stead. Therefore please
teach me forthwith how to manage the boat, so that I may be able to
`relieve' you--as I think you sailors call it--from time to time, as may
prove necessary."
And this was the girl who, while on board ship, had hedged herself in
and kept us all at arm's-length by a barrier of such chill and haughty
reserve as had at times approached very nearly to insolence!
Of course I eagerly accepted her offer--for I foresaw that a time would
very soon arrive when her assistance would be indispensable--and at once
proceeded to initiate her into the art of steering. Unfortunately, we
were running dead before the wind at the time--which is the most
difficult point of sailing for a novice to master--yet my new pupil
seemed to grasp the idea at once and without an effort; and a quarter of
an hour later she was watching the run of the sea and checking the
tendency of the boat to round-to almost as knowingly and cleverly as
though she had been sailing a boat all her lifetime.
The moment that I found she could be trusted alone I took up a position
on the midship thwart and, selecting the best-looking fowl from our
stock, proceeded to pluck and draw it, afterwards giving it a good wash
in the salt water alongside. This done, I cut off a leg and, having
skinned it, sliced off a small piece of flesh which, with many
misgivings, I placed in my mouth and began dubiously to masticate. The
idea of devouring raw flesh seemed to me to be exceedingly repulsive and
disgusting, but it was either that or nothing, and, realising the full
truth of Miss Onslow's remark upon the importance of maintaining my
strength, I persevered. And presently, when I had conquered in some
measure the natural repugnance excited by the idea of such food, I found
that really, after all, it was very much a matter of sentiment, and
that, so far as the flavour was concerned, there was nothing at all
objectionable. The taste was of course novel, and peculiar, but I
thought it possible that one might accustom oneself to it without much
difficulty. Yet, just at first, a little sufficed, and when I had
despatched one leg I considered that I had made a particularly hearty
meal. And I felt so much the better for it that I strove to induce Miss
Onslow to try a morsel. She gently reiterated her refusal, however,
while expressing her satisfaction that I had been able to eat. Then,
noticing that her eyes looked heavy, and that her movements were
languid, I arranged the royal as a sort of couch in the stern-sheets for
her, and suggested that she should lie down and endeavour to secure some
rest; to which suggestion she acceded; and in a few minutes, completely
worn out with the unaccustomed excitement, fatigue, and exposure through
which she had so recently passed, she was sleeping by my side as
placidly as an infant.
The sun was sinking into a bank of smoky-looking cloud that stretched
along the horizon on our starboard quarter when my companion awoke,
greatly refreshed by her slumbers, but--as she confessed--ravenously
hungry. I also was beginning to feel anew the pangs of hunger; so,
surrendering the yoke-lines to Miss Onslow, I took advantage of what
remained of the fast-waning daylight to prepare a further portion of raw
fowl to serve us both, taking care to render the appearance of the flesh
as little repulsive as possible. By the time that my preparations--
which I had purposely somewhat protracted--were complete, darkness had
so far closed down upon us that it was scarcely possible to see what we
were eating; and, thus aided, and by dint of much persuasion--
accentuated by a reminder that we habitually ate oysters raw,--I
succeeded in inducing the poor girl to so far lay aside her prejudices
as just to _taste_ the food I offered her. That accomplished, I had no
further trouble with her, for her hunger was by this time so sharp that
food of any sort became palatable, and we both succeeded in making a
fairly good meal.
Meanwhile, the bank of cloud that at sunset had been hovering on the
verge of the western horizon, had been stealthily creeping zenith-ward,
and at the same time spreading out north and south, with a look in it
that seemed to portend more wind; so, as a measure of precaution, I went
to work, upon the conclusion of our meal, and shortened sail by taking
down a couple of reefs in the mainsail, and a single reef in the little
stay foresail which the boat carried. And, this done, I rearranged the
royal in the stern-sheets as a bed for my companion, urging her to turn
in at once and get as much rest as she could.
It was exceedingly fortunate that I had taken the precaution to reef the
canvas of our small hooker; for about an hour or so after sunset--very
shortly, indeed, after the completion of my preparations--the wind
freshened up with quite a touch of spite in it, driving us along at a
speed of fully eight knots, and tugging at the mast as though intent on
dragging it out of the boat altogether; the sea, moreover, began to rise
and break, and by midnight I was in a bath of perspiration induced by
anxiety and the effort to keep the boat ahead of and square end-on to
the combers. This condition of excessive and painful anxiety, by the
way, was quite a new, as well as decidedly unpleasant, experience for
me, and I was deeply mortified and annoyed at the discovery of its
influence upon me. I first took myself severely to task about it, and
then proceeded to seek for the cause of the trouble. I was at first
disposed to attribute it to nerve-shock, induced by the occurrences of
the preceding twenty-four hours, but a further analysis of my feelings
convinced me that my nerves were still to be depended upon as implicitly
as ever, and that the real source of my distress lay at my feet, asleep,
wrapped up in a sail. Yes; there could be no doubt about it; it was on
my companion's account that I was nervous and anxious; I feared being
capsized or swamped simply because of the greatly-increased danger and
discomfort that would in that case accrue to _her_!
At length--probably about two o'clock in the morning--it breezed up so
fiercely, and knocked up such a sea that I dared not run the boat any
longer, so, watching my chance, I put the helm down and hove-to on the
larboard tack, with the boat's head to the northward, and anxiously
awaited the coming of daylight. Soon after this, Miss Onslow awoke, and
seemed considerably alarmed at the change in the weather and the wild
movements of the boat; but I managed to reassure her; and then,
observing that I had lashed the port yoke-line, and was no longer doing
anything, she suggested that we should change places, and that I should
get a little sleep! After my assurances as to the utter absence of any
danger I found it somewhat difficult to make her understand--without
alarming her--that it was still as urgently necessary as ever for me to
watch the boat.
At length the dawn came filtering slowly through a murky and rather
angry-looking sky, and as the darkness gradually melted away from off
the face of the weltering waters I made out the canvas of a large ship,
some eight miles off, to leeward. She had passed us about an hour
earlier, probably not more than three miles away; and had there only
been daylight I should doubtless have succeeded in attracting her
attention. As it was, there was no hope of any such thing now; she was
sailing away from instead of toward us, and sailors seldom look astern;
their attention is mostly directed to what lies ahead. And even had it
been otherwise, it was too late now to think of making ourselves seen;
she was too far off; and chasing her was quite out of the question, for
she was bowling along under topgallant studding-sails, making the utmost
of a fair wind, while we dared show no more than double-reefed canvas.
Fortunately, Miss Onslow was sleeping again, and did not see the
stranger, which had run out of sight beyond the horizon by the time that
my companion next awoke, so I did not mention the circumstance. The
appearance of this vessel, however, was cheering and encouraging,
inasmuch as it tended to show that I was still in the track of shipping.
As the day wore slowly on the wind steadily freshened until it was
blowing a single-reefed topsail breeze, that brought with it a
corresponding increase in the height and run of the seas, which at
length became so dangerous that I dared no longer keep the boat under
sail, but was constrained to douse the canvas and use it, with the mast
and oars, as a floating anchor for the boat. Riding to these, at the
full scope of our rather long painter, we were much more easy and
comfortable; but this advantage was discounted to a great extent by the
fact that during the day two other vessels passed us--at too great a
distance to allow of our attracting their attention, low down in the
water as we were, and with no means of signalling to them, yet not so
far off but that we might have been seen had there been a pair of sharp
eyes aboard; while if it had been possible for us to carry sail, we
might have easily intercepted either of them. It was a cruelly bitter
disappointment to us to see these two craft go sliding along the horizon
while I wore myself out with unavailing efforts to attract their
attention. My companion bore her disappointment bravely; she even chid
me gently when I sank down exhausted into the bottom of the boat, with a
bitter curse upon the blindness of the crew, as the second of the two
ships vanished beyond the rim of the horizon; and she reminded me more
than once of words I had spoken to her earlier in the day, to the effect
that although we might miss half a dozen ships through their passing us
at too great a distance to allow of our being seen, the seventh would be
sure to come booming right down upon us, and our only difficulty would
be to avoid being run down by her. But later on, when the darkness had
once more closed down upon us, shutting out everything but the towering,
swooping, phosphorescent crests of the threatening seas, I caught her
softly, silently, and secretly crying; and the sight of her distress
aroused a sudden furious anger in me that caused me to again and still
more savagely execrate the blind lookout kept aboard the vessels that
had that day passed us. And then I began to wonder, bitterly, how many
poor souls--weak, helpless, delicate women and children, and
famine-stricken men--had perished miserably, after drifting about the
ocean for days that were veritable eternities of suffering, yet might
have been rescued had the officer of the watch aboard a passing ship but
bestowed a trifle more interest and attention upon the small, distant,
indistinctly-seen object that for an instant caught his gaze, and which
he all too hastily assumed to be the slanting pinion of some wandering
sea bird, or the leaping crest of a distant wave.
We rode thus all through the night, and well on toward noon the next
day, when the weather moderated sufficiently to permit me to make sail
once more. But as the day wore on the wind gradually hauled round until
it was dead on end for us; and nightfall found us heading to the
southward, with the wind out at about east-south-east.
This state of things prevailed for the next four days, during which no
further vessels were sighted, although it is possible that some may have
passed us during the night at such a distance as to be invisible in the
darkness. During this time we were put to great straits for want of
food, and suffered all the tortures of slow starvation; for the drowned
poultry soon putrefied and became so offensive that we had to heave them
overboard. I tried to supply the deficiency by fishing, but only
succeeded in capturing one small shark, about eighteen inches long,
which was fortunately hooked in the mouth in such a way that he could
not cut through the line with his teeth. During this time I watched and
steered the boat all through the night; Miss Onslow relieving me during
the hours of daylight, in order that I might secure a few hours of
much-needed rest. But I was far too anxious, as well as in too much
suffering, to sleep; the utmost that I could achieve was to doze
fitfully and for a few minutes at a time, during which my imagination
conjured up the most tormenting dreams, from which I usually awoke with
a violent start and a terrified cry. Then I would spring upon a thwart
and search the horizon eagerly and feverishly for the sight of a sail,
following this up with a renewed attempt to catch a fish or two. I
shall never forget the courage and fortitude exhibited by Miss Onslow
during this trying period; she never uttered a single word of complaint
or impatience, although it was impossible for her to conceal the fact
that she suffered acutely; and whenever she found me unusually silent
and, as she thought, giving way to dejection, she always had ready a
word or two of encouragement.
Thus matters wearily and painfully progressed with us until six days and
seven nights had dragged their slow length away, and a full week had
elapsed since the sinking of the _City of Cawnpore_. We were still
working our way to the southward, against an amount of wind and sea that
were quite as much as the boat could look at; and Miss Onslow was at my
feet, wrapped up in the sail, and moaning in her troubled sleep; the
hour being about one o'clock in the morning. I was of course _always_
on the lookout for a ship, night and day, but the time had now arrived
when I began to see craft that had no existence save in my disordered
imagination; I was therefore neither surprised nor elated when I
suddenly became aware of a vague, indefinite shadow of deeper darkness,
faintly and doubtfully showing against the horizon broad on my weather
bow; I simply regarded it as another phantom, and thought no more about
it. Yet I kept my gaze fixed upon it, nevertheless--since. I had
nothing better to occupy my attention; and presently a peculiarity of
this vision--not shared by the others I had seen--forced itself upon my
notice, inasmuch as that, while the other phantom ships that I had seen
had exhibited a propensity to rush over the surface of the ocean at
lightning speed, and to appear in half a dozen quarters or more in as
many seconds, this one obstinately persisted in maintaining the precise
position in which I had at first discovered her. And it presently
dawned upon me that she had another peculiarity, namely, that of an
opacity sufficiently dense to temporarily blot out any low-lying star
that the movement of the boat happened to bring into line with her. The
full significance of these peculiarities at length became suggestive,
and it began to dawn upon me that possibly the craft out yonder might
not, after all, be a phantom; she might be the vessel destined to afford
us rescue and salvation; the vessel for which I had all along been
looking, and the eventual appearance of which I had so frequently and so
confidently predicted to Miss Onslow.