The boatswain followed him out, muttering in his beard.
CHAPTER V.
THE ENGLISHMAN’S RELATION
(THE ISLAND).
“Close and bolt the door,” said the Englishman so soon as we were alone. “That Quartermaster, saintly soul, may be hereabout. So. And now, my lad, get you into your hammock again, and to sleep.”
But sleep was gone from me, and, when I had told him so, he proffered to relate his experiences to me, to pass the vigil. “And certainly,” added he, “they are sufficiently strange.”
You may be sure I was nothing loth; and, when I had put on some clothes, and brought a chair to his bedside and seated myself, he thus began:
“’Twas some two years ago, lad, that I had occasion to ship as passenger on a ship bound for Fort St. George.[A] We left the Downs with fair wind and weather, which continued with us till we were come into the Indian Ocean. But then arose a huge hurricane of wind, which blew us from our course. It held six days, and left us somewhere near the Island of Sumatra. Yet the ship remained whole; and we steered north to recover our course, with but a fret of wind. We scarce had got into a sailing posture, but we saw a ship, which came towards us. And, wanting something—I forget what it was—we made a wiff to her. But we got more than we wanted! For, clapping on a wind, and coming on, they began to fire at us as hot as they could, and brought our mainmast by the board.
“Well, they boarded us—as villainous a crew as ever sailed the sea; and, though we made a good fight, ’twas all one: our ship was taken. We expected to be all murdered, or at least set ashore to starve on some desolate island.” (Here I saw the door handle turn slowly and softly round, but forbore to tell the Englishman, lest he should break off in his relation.) “Yet we were reserved alive, to what strange, surprising experiences I’ll tell you.
“They set many of us down upon the ballast, of whom I was one. Penned together like cattle in that darksome and stinking place, we scarce could stir hand or foot, scarce draw breath. We knew not the day from the night. Our victuals, thrown to us as to dogs, scarce were fit for dogs. The place was full of vermin; and there were great rats. Their eyes gleamed in the darkness like points of fire; and, ever and again, as at a signal, the creatures came swarming down upon us.
“How long this lasted I know not. Certainly many days. All fell sick, some raved with the calenture, three died. But on a blessed morn, at daybreak, they dragged us up out of the pit to the deck. Imagine what it meant to us! You cannot—as you cannot possibly imagine that dreadful prison. And no man apprizes at their worth light and air and health and freedom, look you, until he lose them.
“Indeed the suddenness of the change was more than we could bear—so that three of our company fell down in a swoon. ’Twas strange to see, I doubt not—ay, and pitiful! But no breath of pity moved the villainous hearts. They threw all the swooning men into the sea.