cene on the opening of
five or six of them to the sunshine. They lay in such wise that the
shadow of the cloud covered them all as with a veil, the skirts of
which, trailing, left them to leap one after the other into the noontide
dazzle; and as each one shot from the shadow the flash was like a
volcanic spouting of white flame enriched with the prismatic dyes of
emeralds, rubies, sapphires, and gems of lovely hue.

To determine the hour and our position I fetched a quadrant from my
cabin, and was happily just in time to catch the sun crossing the
meridian. My watch was half an hour fast, so I had been out of my
reckoning to the extent of thirty minutes ever since I had been cast
away. I made our latitude to be sixty-four degrees twenty-eight minutes
south, and the computation was perhaps near enough.

This business ended, I went to the cook-house to prepare dinner, and the
first object I saw was Tassard flat upon his face near the door that
opened into the cabin. He groaned when I picked him up, which I managed
without much exertion of strength, for so much had he shrunk that I dare
say more than half his weight lay in his clothes; and set him upon his
bench with his back to the dresser. I put my mouth to his ear and
roared, "Are you hurt?" His head nodded as if he understood me, but I
question if he did. He was the completest picture of old age that you
could imagine. I fetched a couple of spears from the arms-room, and,
cutting them to his height, put one in each hand that he might keep
himself propped; and whilst my own dinner was broiling I made him a mess
of broth with which I fed him, for now that he had the sticks he would
not let go of them. But in any case I doubt if his trembling hand could
have lifted the spoon to his lips without capsizing the contents down
his beard.

With some small idea of rallying the old villain, I mixed him a very
stiff bumper of brandy, which he supped down out of my hand with the
utmost avidity. The draught soon worked in him, and he began to move his
head about, seeking me in his blind way, and then cried in his broken
notes, "I have lost the use of my legs and cannot walk. Mother of God,
what shall I do! O holy St. Antonio, what is to become of me?"

I guessed from this that, impelled by habit or some small spur of
reason, he had risen to go on deck and fallen. He went on vapouring
pitifully, gazing with sufficient steadfastness to let me understand
that his vision received so