chedness in short snatches of fitful sleep; at all events
I caught at intervals the sound of low mutterings, as of sleeping men;
but, as for me, exhausted though I was, I could not sleep. My anxiety
on behalf of these poor wretches, who were in a way under my command,
and who were certainly dependent to a great extent upon my experience
and judgment, seemed to have driven sleep for ever from my eyes.

And so we lay there, hour after hour, now flung aloft until the whole
ocean to the limits of the horizon lay spread around us, anon sweeping
down the back of some giant billow until it seemed that the boat was
about to plunge to the ocean's bed, and the passage of every hour was
marked by an increasing greyness and haggardness in the faces of my
companions, while a more hopelessly despairing expression came into
their eyes.

At length, however, shortly before sunset, a welcome break appeared in
the sky to windward; a gleam of watery, yellow light spread along the
horizon; the pall of murky vapour broke up into detached masses; small
but gradually widening patches of blue sky appeared here and here; and
finally we got a momentary glimpse of the sun through a break in the
clouds, just as the great luminary was on the point of sinking below the
western horizon. We greeted the blessed sight with a cheer of reviving
hope, for we knew that the gale was breaking, and that with the
moderating of the wind and sea we should once again be able to take some
active steps toward our preservation; while, apart from that, the finer
weather would at least afford us some relief from our present suffering
and misery. About half an hour later there was a noticeable diminution
in the strength of the wind, which by midnight had become merely a
moderate breeze. The sea no longer broke dangerously, the sky cleared,
the stars beamed benignantly down upon us, and there was every prospect
of our being able to resume our voyage on the morrow. But although, so
far as the weather was concerned, matters were greatly improving with
us, our suffering from cold was still very acute, for the night wind
seemed to penetrate right through our wet clothes and to strike colder
than ice upon our skins that were now burning with fever.

As for me, I envied my more fortunate companions who were able to sleep.
I was deadly weary, worn out with prolonged watching and anxiety and
exposure; my eyes were burning and my head throbbing with the fever that
consumed