74 OUR SEARCH FOR A WILDERNESS. 



besides adding decidedly to the slowness of the ticking of the 

 watch marking the passage of the hours of darkness. I lay 

 in my berth as long as I could endure it; dreaming now and 

 then of being buried alive, then rising with a start and striking 

 my head against the coffin lid of my catacomb. At last I 

 abandoned it for the floor of the cabin, sloping and under 

 five feet in total length though it was. I found it was better 

 to be huddled in a forlorn little bundle on the floor than in 

 that hole which by no stretch of the imagination could be 

 called a berth. 



Overhead the crew worked fitfully all night long. I could 

 move the hatch curtain, look up and see the sturdy old 

 Captain with his hand on the rudder — a picture which was 

 to become familiar to us through many nights. What a 

 picturesque old figure he was — rugged and stern, vet as 

 gentle and courteous as any gentleman of the old school — 

 and bearing his three-score and eight years with wonderful 

 vigor. Now and then his deep voice would rise above the 

 roar of wind and waves in hoarse commands in Spanish to 

 the crew. Then he would push the rudder hard up, the 

 boom would swing over with a jerk which made the whole 

 sloop tremble and a wave would wash over the deck and 

 send a trickle of cold drops down upon my face. Smothered 

 exclamations from the crew and the sound of their bare feet 

 splashing along the deck would end the audible part of the 

 manoeuvre. Then I would shift to meet the new angle of the 

 floor and wait for the next race of the rats. 



Now and then the Captain would reach behind the hatch 

 curtain for his watch and examine its dripping face by the 

 light of the candle in the compass box. " Faltan las cinco a 

 la una," he would mutter, and I knew that midnight had 

 passed and that somewhere in our wake, morning was on its 

 way to end this night of nights. The tempest increased and 

 tossed our sloop like a flying leaf. Sometimes it seemed as 



