e sail was not drawing, but the wind moved the boat
onward. However, Mackintosh gained slowly, and Hazel held up an oar like
a spear, and shouted to him that he must promise solemnly to forego all
violence, or he should never come on board alive.

Mackintosh opened his mouth to reply; but, at the same moment, his eyes
suddenly dilated in a fearful way, and he went under water, with a
gurgling cry. Yet not like one drowning, but with a jerk.

The next moment there was a great bubbling of the water, as if displaced
by some large creatures struggling below, and then the surface was
stained with blood.

And, lest there should be any doubt as to the wretched man's fate, the
huge black fin of a monstrous shark came soon after, gliding round and
round the rolling boat, awaiting the next victim.

Now, while the water was yet stained with his life-blood, who, hurrying
to kill, had met with a violent death, the unwounded sailor, Fenner,
excited by the fracas, broke forth into singing, and so completed the
horror of a wild and awful scene; for still, while he shouted, laughed,
and sang, the shark swam calmly round and round, and the boat crept on,
her white sail bespattered with blood--which was not so before--and in
her bottom lay one man dead as a stone; and two poor wretches, Prince and
Welch, their short-lived feud composed forever, sat openly sucking their
bleeding wounds, to quench for a moment their intolerable thirst.

Oh, little do we, who never pass a single day without bite or sup, know
the animal Man, in these dire extremities.

CHAPTER XXII.

AT last Cooper ordered Fenner to hold his jaw, and come aft, and help
sail the boat.

But the man, being now stark mad, took no notice of the order. His
madness grew on him, and took a turn by no means uncommon in these cases.
He saw before him sumptuous feasts, and streams of fresh water flowing.
These he began to describe with great volubility and rapture, smacking
his lips and exulting. And so he went on tantalizing them till noon.

Meantime, Cooper asked Mr. Hazel if he could sail the boat.

"I can steer," said he, "but that is all. My right arm is benumbed."

The silvery voice of Helen Rolleston then uttered brave and welcome
words. "I will do whatever you tell me, Mr. Cooper."

"Long life to you, miss!" said the wounded seaman. He then directed her
how to reef the sail, and splice the sheet which he had been obliged to
cut; and, in a word, to sail the boat;