nto the timber: a violent and--from the amount of dry rot in
the wreck--a mortifying exercise. Every night saw a deeper inroad into
the bones of the Flying Scud--more beams tapped and hewn in splinters,
more planking peeled away and tossed aside--and every night saw us as
far as ever from the end and object of our arduous devastation. In this
perpetual disappointment, my courage did not fail me, but my spirits
dwindled; and Nares himself grew silent and morose. At night, when
supper was done, we passed an hour in the cabin, mostly without speech:
I, sometimes dozing over a book; Nares, sullenly but busily drilling
sea-shells with the instrument called a Yankee Fiddle. A stranger might
have supposed we were estranged; as a matter of fact, in this silent
comradeship of labour, our intimacy grew.

I had been struck, at the first beginning of our enterprise upon the
wreck, to find the men so ready at the captain's lightest word. I
dare not say they liked, but I can never deny that they admired him
thoroughly. A mild word from his mouth was more valued than flattery
and half a dollar from myself; if he relaxed at all from his habitual
attitude of censure, smiling alacrity surrounded him; and I was led to
think his theory of captainship, even if pushed to excess, reposed upon
some ground of reason. But even terror and admiration of the
captain failed us before the end. The men wearied of the hopeless,
unremunerative quest and the long strain of labour. They began to
shirk and grumble. Retribution fell on them at once, and retribution
multiplied the grumblings. With every day it took harder driving to keep
them to the daily drudge; and we, in our narrow boundaries, were kept
conscious every moment of the ill-will of our assistants.

In spite of the best care, the object of our search was perfectly well
known to all on board; and there had leaked out besides some knowledge
of those inconsistencies that had so greatly amazed the captain and
myself. I could overhear the men debate the character of Captain Trent,
and set forth competing theories of where the opium was stowed; and as
they seemed to have been eavesdropping on ourselves, I thought little
shame to prick up my ears when I had the return chance of spying upon
them, in this way. I could diagnose their temper and judge how far they
were informed upon the mystery of the Flying Scud. It was after having
thus overheard some almost mutinous speeches that a fortunate idea
cro