the day, in order that I
might be fresh and lively for an unbroken watch through the hours of
darkness. Having arrived at this conclusion, I forthwith proceeded to
carry out my plan, and found it to act fairly well; the only drawback
being, that, for want of watching, the felucca evinced a tendency to run
a little off the wind, while, when I attempted to remedy this by lashing
the helm an inch or two less a-weather, she erred to about the same
extent in the other direction by gradually coming-to until her sail was
all shaking, and I had to jump hurriedly to my feet and jam the helm
hard up to prevent her from coming round upon the other tack. Little by
little, however, I remedied both these defects, so that by sunset I had
her going along just "full and by," almost as steadily as though I had
been standing at the tiller and steering her.

Meanwhile, the wind, which had been very moderate all day, with a
distinctly perceptible disposition to become still lighter, had
gradually softened down until the little hooker was barely doing her
three knots per hour, while the sea had dwindled away until only the
long, regular undulations of the swell were left, these being overrun by
a wrinkling of those small, uncrested wavelets that frequently precede
the setting-in of a calm. Yet there was no reason why a calm should be
anticipated, for I was in a region where the trade wind blows all the
year round, except when, for a few hours, it gives place to one of the
hurricanes that occasionally sweep over the Caribbean with devastating
effect. Could it be possible that such a phenomenon was about to
happen? There was no especial reason why it might not be so, for it was
the "hurricane season." But there was no sign in the heavens of any
approaching atmospheric disturbance--unless, indeed, that faint,
scarcely perceptible, hazy appearance up aloft had a sinister meaning!

When the sun had declined to within a few minutes of his setting, I
shinned up the mast and took a good look round; but there was nothing in
sight. Waiting, therefore, until the sun had sunk below the horizon,--
which he did in the midst of a thin, smoky haze, through which the
rayless luminary glowed like a ball of red-hot iron,--I descended to the
deck and forthwith set to work to prepare myself such a supper as the
meagre resources of the felucca permitted; after discussing which, as
the stars were shining brilliantly overhead, and the little craft was
stee