ls with the weight of the gale behind her, till at
last there was the open sea.

Within a few feet of the tiller was a deck-house, in which the crew ate,
built of solid oak and clamped with iron. Here was food in plenty, ale,
too, and with these we filled ourselves. Also, leaving Kari to hold the
tiller, I took off my armour and in place of it clothed myself in the
rough sea garments that lay about with tall greased boots, and then sent
him to do likewise.

Soon we lost sight of land and were climbing the great ocean billows,
whose foamy crests rolled and spurted wherever the eye fell. We could
set no course but must go where the gale drove us, away, away we knew
not whither. As I have said, the _Blanche_ was new and strong and the
best ship that ever I had sailed in upon a heavy sea. Moreover, her
hatches were closed down, for this the sailors had done after we
weighed, so she rode the waters like a duck, taking no harm. Oh! well
it was for me that from my childhood I had had to do with ships and the
sailing of them, and flying from the following waves thus was able to
steer and keep the _Blanche's_ poop right in the wind, which seemed to
blow first from one quarter and then from that.

Now over my memory of these events there comes a great confusion and
sense of amazement. All became fragmentary and disjointed, separated
also by what seemed to be considerable periods of time--days or weeks
perhaps. There was a sense of endless roaring seas before which the ship
fled on and on, driven by a screaming gale that I noted dimly seemed to
blow first from the northwest and then steadily from the east.

I see myself, very distinctly, lashing the tiller to iron rings that
were screwed in the deck beams, and know that I did this because I
was too weak to hold it any longer and desired to set it so that the
_Blanche_ should continue to drive straight before the gale. I see
myself lying in the deck-house of which I have spoken, while Kari fed me
with food and water and sometimes thrust into my mouth little pellets of
I knew not what, which he took from the leathern bag he wore about him.
I remembered that bag. It had been on his person when I rescued him at
the quay, for I had seen it first as he washed himself afterwards, half
full of something, and wondered what it contained. Later, I had seen it
in his hand again when we left my house after the death of Blanche. I
noted that whenever he gave me one of these pellets I see