of the ship: apart
from which claims of rank, he was striking enough by mere personal
appearance to have commanded the homage of very particular attention
from any judicious spectator. His figure was short, broad, and
prodigiously muscular; his limbs, though stunted, appearing knotty and
(in woodman's language) gnarled; at the same time that the trunk of his
body was lusty--and, for a seaman, somewhat unwieldy. In age he seemed
nearer to seventy than sixty; but still manifested an unusual strength
hardened to the temper of steel by constant exposure to the elements
and by a life of activity. The colour of his hair was probably white;
that is, _per se_, and with reference to its absolute or fundamental
base; but by smoke and neglect it had been tarnished into grim upper
strata of rusty grey and sullen yellow--which, contrasted with a broad
fiery disk of face--harsh bushy eyebrows--and a Bardolph nose,
effectually extinguished all ideas of the _venerable_ which might else
have been suggested by his age. A pair of keen grey eyes looked out
from a mass of flesh in which they were sunk; and by their cat-like
glances showed pretty clearly that in the hour of danger and conflict
they could awaken into another sort of expression more characteristic
of the man; an expression however, which, in this "piping time of
peace" and in the hours of his gentle morning potations, was content
habitually to slumber. The Captain's gait we have described as
"rolling;" which in fact it was; but without meaning at all, by that
expression, to derogate from its firmness: for firm it also was as the
tread of a hippopotamus; and wheresoever the sole of his vast splay
foot was planted, _there_ a man would have sworn it had taken root like
a young oak: but a figure as broad as his could do no other than roll
when treading the deck of a vessel that was ploughing through a gay
tumbling sea. As to dress, the Captain wore long slops of striped
linen; stout shoes; and immense shoe-buckles: but for the upper
part of his costume, in spite of his official dignity, he chose to
sport--instead of the long uniform coat of a French captain, a short
blue jacket worn over a red waistcoat; to which last was attached a
broad leathern belt bearing a brace of pistols; and depending from the
belt by a short chain he carried a Turkish scymeter in a silver
scabbard. Upon his head only could he be said to wear any mark of
distinction that proclaimed his rank; for upon his h