still seemed to hear the din of weapons,
and awoke only when the sun was high in the heavens, and sent down his
burning rays upon my face. Full of wonder, I gazed about me; storm,
ship, the bodies, and all that I had heard in the night, recurred to
me as a dream; but when I looked around, I found all as it had been
the day before. Immoveable lay the bodies, immoveably was the Captain
fastened to the mast; I laughed at my dream, and proceeded in search
of my old companion.

The latter was seated in sorrowful meditation in the cabin. "O
master," he exclaimed as I entered, "rather would I lie in the deepest
bottom of the sea, than pass another night in this enchanted ship." I
asked him the reason of his grief, and thus he answered me:--

"When I had slept an hour, I awoke, and heard the noise of walking to
and fro over my head. I thought at first that it was you, but there
were at least twenty running around; I also heard conversation and
cries. At length came heavy steps upon the stairs. After this I was no
longer conscious; but at times my recollection returned for a moment,
and then I saw the same man who is nailed to the mast, sit down at
that table, singing and drinking; and he who lies not far from him on
the floor, in a scarlet cloak, sat near him, and helped him to drink."
Thus spoke my old servant to me.

You may believe me, my friends, that all was not right to my mind;
for there was no delusion--I too had plainly heard the dead. To sail
in such company was to me horrible; my Ibrahim, however, was again
absorbed in deep reflection. "I have it now!" he exclaimed at length;
there occurred to him, namely, a little verse, which his grandfather,
a man of experience and travel, had taught him, and which could give
assistance against every ghost and spectre. He also maintained that we
could, the next night, prevent the unnatural sleep which had come upon
us, by repeating right fervently sentences out of the Koran.

The proposition of the old man pleased me well. In anxious expectation
we saw the night set in. Near the cabin was a little room, to which we
determined to retire. We bored several holes in the door, large enough
to give us a view of the whole cabin; then we shut it as firmly as we
could from within, and Ibrahim wrote the name of the Prophet in all
four corners of the room. Thus we awaited the terrors of the night.

It might again have been about the eleventh hour, when a strong
inclination for sleep be