that the servant's anxious fidelity had something to do
with the matter; inasmuch as the timely interruption served to rally his
master from the mood which had evidently been coming upon him.

The place called the cuddy was a light deck-cabin formed by the poop, a
sort of attic to the large cabin below. Part of it had formerly been
the quarters of the officers; but since their death all the partitioning
had been thrown down, and the whole interior converted into one spacious
and airy marine hall; for absence of fine furniture and picturesque
disarray of odd appurtenances, somewhat answering to the wide, cluttered
hall of some eccentric bachelor-squire in the country, who hangs his
shooting-jacket and tobacco-pouch on deer antlers, and keeps his
fishing-rod, tongs, and walking-stick in the same corner.

The similitude was heightened, if not originally suggested, by glimpses
of the surrounding sea; since, in one aspect, the country and the ocean
seem cousins-german.

The floor of the cuddy was matted. Overhead, four or five old muskets
were stuck into horizontal holes along the beams. On one side was a
claw-footed old table lashed to the deck; a thumbed missal on it, and
over it a small, meagre crucifix attached to the bulk-head. Under the
table lay a dented cutlass or two, with a hacked harpoon, among some;
melancholy old rigging, like a heap of poor friars' girdles. There were
also two long, sharp-ribbed settees of Malacca cane, black with age,
and uncomfortable to look at as inquisitors' racks, with a large,
misshapen arm-chair, which, furnished with a rude barber's crotch at the
back, working with a screw, seemed some grotesque engine of torment. A
flag locker was in one corner, open, exposing various colored bunting,
some rolled up, others half unrolled, still others tumbled. Opposite was
a cumbrous washstand, of black mahogany, all of one block, with a
pedestal, like a font, and over it a railed shelf, containing combs,
brushes, and other implements of the toilet. A torn hammock of stained
grass swung near; the sheets tossed, and the pillow wrinkled up like a
brow, as if who ever slept here slept but illy, with alternate
visitations of sad thoughts and bad dreams.

The further extremity of the cuddy, overhanging the ship's stern, was
pierced with three openings, windows or port-holes, according as men or
cannon might peer, socially or unsocially, out of them. At present
neither men nor cannon were seen, though h