O WING to the cant of the vessel, the masts hung
far out over the water, and from my perch on
the cross-trees I had nothing below me but
the surface of the bay. Hands, who was not so far up,
was, in consequence, nearer to the ship, and fell between
me and the bulwarks. He rose once to the surface in
a lather of foam and blood, and then sunk again
for good. As the water settled, I could see him
lying huddled together on the clean, bright sand in
the shadow of the vessel's sides. A fish or two
whipped past his body. Sometimes, by the quiver-
ing of the water, he appeared to move a little, as if
he were trying to rise. But he was dead enough,
for all that, being both shot and drowned, and was
food for fish in the very place where he had designed
my slaughter.

I was no sooner certain of this than I began to feel
sick, faint, and terrified. The hot blood was running
over my back and chest. The dirk, where it had
pinned my shoulder to the mast, seemed to burn like
a hot iron, yet it was not so much these real sufferings
that distressed me, for these, it seemed to me, I
could bear without a murmur; it was the horror I had

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