et under way, sir?"

"What's the good of letting go our hold of the ground only to drift, Mr.
Burns?" I answered.

He sighed and I left him to his immobility. His hold on life was
as slender as his hold on sanity. I was oppressed by my lonely
responsibilities. I went into my cabin to seek relief in a few hours'
sleep, but almost before I closed my eyes the man on deck came down
reporting a light breeze. Enough to get under way with, he said.

And it was no more than just enough. I ordered the windlass manned, the
sails loosed, and the topsails set. But by the time I had cast the ship
I could hardly feel any breath of wind. Nevertheless, I trimmed the
yards and put everything on her. I was not going to give up the attempt.

PART TWO

IV

With her anchor at the bow and clothed in canvas to her very trucks, my
command seemed to stand as motionless as a model ship set on the gleams
and shadows of polished marble. It was impossible to distinguish land
from water in the enigmatical tranquillity of the immense forces of the
world. A sudden impatience possessed me.

"Won't she answer the helm at all?" I said irritably to the man whose
strong brown hands grasping the spokes of the wheel stood out lighted on
the darkness; like a symbol of mankind's claim to the direction of its
own fate.

He answered me.

"Yes, sir. She's coming-to slowly."

"Let her head come up to south."

"Aye, aye, sir."

I paced the poop. There was not a sound but that of my footsteps, till
the man spoke again.

"She is at south now, sir."

I felt a slight tightness of the chest before I gave out the first
course of my first command to the silent night, heavy with dew and
sparkling with stars. There was a finality in the act committing me to
the endless vigilance of my lonely task.

"Steady her head at that," I said at last. "The course is south."

"South, sir," echoed the man.

I sent below the second mate and his watch and remained in charge,
walking the deck through the chill, somnolent hours that precede the
dawn.

Slight puffs came and went, and whenever they were strong enough to wake
up the black water the murmur alongside ran through my very heart in
a delicate crescendo of delight and died away swiftly. I was bitterly
tired. The very stars seemed weary of waiting for daybreak. It came at
last with a mother-of-pearl sheen at the zenith, such as I had never
seen before in the tropics, unglowing, almost gray, with a s