e upturning of a mighty grave."

But the sound told other things to the workmen: the wheel began to
revolve; after many revolutions, the waters began to boil as if moved by
a ground swell, and the large black engine appeared rising up like a
mighty monster of the deep.

When the bell was fairly suspended above the water, the crane was
pulled round, and the heavy appendage was wheeled over the deck of the
lighter. There were three individuals in it, seated high and dry upon
the _vis-a-vis_ seats. There were instruments of various kinds hung
round the inside, the uses of which were explained to me. The men told
me that a storm, a few days before, had so broken up and removed the
wreck, that it would be necessary to pull the lighter a little farther
to the eastward. It came out, too, with some indications of terror which
they attempted to conceal, that the dead bodies of those who had
perished in the cabin were beginning to make their appearance, now that
the hull was broken. Mr W---- looked at me askance, as if to ascertain
whether that circumstance would have any effect in making me forego my
purpose in descending; and, doubtless, he observed me shudder. But he
knew me not: the expedition possessed greater, perhaps grimmer charms to
me on that account: the horror that passed over me, as I heard the
statement of the men, was only an indication that my zeal was stirred by
the expectation of food for my depraved appetite.

"Dead men are not the most dangerous enemies of divers," said Mr W----,
with a grim smile. "We have sometimes greater reason to be alarmed from
inroads of the living inhabitants of the waters. It is not a week yet
since the fearful _tenth_ signal rung from the deep; and, upon the
machine being raised in great alarm by the workers of the crane, it was
ascertained that a shoal of finners (some of them fourteen feet long)
had passed close by the mouth of the bell, with a noise like the rushing
of a mighty army. But the alarm was greater on the side of the creatures
themselves: on observing the bell with the men in it, they lashed their
tails with fearful fury, till the waters seemed to boil in the midst of
them, and the whole host were enshrined in a thick muddy medium that
prevented the divers from seeing an inch before them. The sound,
meanwhile, was like that of thunder--snorting, lashing, and shrill
cries, produced by some action of their breathing organs, were mixed
together; and the confusion into wh