llar," said he, "not every man is so great a coward as he
thinks he is--nor yet so good a Christian." He did not guess how true he
spoke! For the fact is, the thoughts which had come to me in the
violence of the storm retained their hold upon my spirit; and the words
that rose to my lips unbidden in the instancy of prayer continued to
sound in my ears: with what shameful consequences it is fitting I should
honestly relate; for I could not support a part of such disloyalty as to
describe the sins of others and conceal my own.

The wind fell, but the sea hove ever the higher. All night the
_Nonesuch_ rolled outrageously; the next day dawned, and the next, and
brought no change. To cross the cabin was scarce possible; old
experienced seamen were cast down upon the deck, and one cruelly mauled
in the concussion; every board and block in the old ship cried out
aloud; and the great bell by the anchor-bitts continually and dolefully
rang. One of these days the Master and I sate alone together at the
break of the poop. I should say the _Nonesuch_ carried a high, raised
poop. About the top of it ran considerable bulwarks, which made the ship
unweatherly: and these, as they approached the front on each side, ran
down in a fine, old-fashioned, carven scroll to join the bulwarks of the
waist. From this disposition, which seems designed rather for ornament
than use, it followed there was a discontinuance of protection: and
that, besides, at the very margin of the elevated part where (in certain
movements of the ship) it might be the most needful. It was here we were
sitting: our feet hanging down, the Master betwixt me and the side, and
I holding on with both hands to the grating of the cabin skylight; for
it struck me it was a dangerous position, the more so as I had
continually before my eyes a measure of our evolutions in the person of
the Master, which stood out in the break of the bulwarks against the
sun. Now his head would be in the zenith and his shadow fall quite
beyond the _Nonesuch_ on the farther side; and now he would swing down
till he was underneath my feet, and the line of the sea leaped high
above him like the ceiling of a room. I looked on upon this with a
growing fascination, as birds are said to look on snakes. My mind,
besides, was troubled with an astonishing diversity of noises; for now
that we had all sails spread in the vain hope to bring her to the sea,
the ship sounded like a factory with their reverberatio