"See how she buries that lee cat-head;
Hold on, good Yankee pine!"
The foc's'le presented a dreary interior, and seemed more calculated to produce melancholy and sourness than gaiety; yet, as the light from the lamp fell upon the rover's face, there was a look of exultation upon it; his eyes glittered and beamed with a great content, whilst the corners of his lips curved and his mouth opened with a bright, unconscious smile.
A born fighter, the blood of battle was surging in his veins, roused by the tempestuous strife with the elements. The queer fascination of danger gripped him; he gloried in the desperate struggle with those two mighty ones, the wind and sea, in all the grandeur of their fearful passions.
It is not given to every nature to feel this strange delight in battle, this glorious uplifting of the soul in moments of great stress or peril, this queer, sweet sensation of sheer personal joy which tingles through a man's blood and converts it into electric fluid, whilst it cools his nerve, clears and sharpens his brain, and enables him to take no heed of hunger or thirst, heat or cold, bruises or knockdowns, but to accomplish prodigies of strength, endurance, and valour with a cold, icy courage and unwearying muscles.
Broncho stared at the rover with wondering eyes, then glanced round as if to see wherein lay the cause of this strange joy.
On the floor of the foc's'le three inches of water washed steadily backwards and forwards at each heave of the tumbling vessel; from a line overhead suspended a row of yellow oilskin coats and pants, which swayed gravely to the rolling like so many headless bodies. Everything seemed damp and miserable; the air was close and foul and the wet clothing steamed; a mess of debris and wreckage washed wearily to and fro on the flood; tired men with aching limbs lay silent between their damp blankets, whilst that great comforter, the pipe, sent out great clouds of smoke from each pair of lips.
Outside, mingling with the crash of the seas, the stormfiend could be heard playing his great oratorio.
"We shore seems to be havin' a mighty strenuous time of it," replied Broncho slowly, "though how you contrives to accoomilate joy an' delight tharfrom has me a heap surprised. What with the way this here locoed ship's a-buckin' an' pitchin' worse'n the meanest cayuse that ever wears ha'r, an' the waves like stampeded landslides a-pourin' over one an' a-heavin' one around without consultin' nobody's opeenions on the proposition, it's shore toomultuous an' is due to have me some ravelled an' frayed if it keeps up this vigorous high-flung gait."
"Waache eein bietje!" laughed Jack. "This cattle stampede's merely beginning; it's just taking a preliminary pasear. Wait till we get into the clutches of a Cape Horn snorter."