Jackson threw himself back in his bed-place and was silent. So was I, for I was recalling all that he had told me, and my doubts were raised as to the truth of it. I did not like his hurrying over the latter portion of his narrative in the way which he had done. What he had said about my mother was not satisfactory. I had for some time been gradually drawing towards him, not only showing, but feeling, for him a great increase of good-will; but suspicion had entered my mind, and I now began to feel my former animosity towards him renewed. A night’s sleep, however, and more reflection, induced me to think that possibly I was judging him too harshly, and as I could not afford to quarrel with him, our intercourse remained as amicable as before, particularly as he become more and more amiable towards me, and did everything in his power to interest and amuse me.
I was one day reading to him the account of a monkey, given in the book of Natural History, in which it is said that that animal is fond of spirits and will intoxicate itself, and Jackson was telling me many anecdotes of monkeys on board of the vessel he had sailed in, when it occurred to me that I had never thought of mentioning to him, or of ascertaining the contents of the cask which had been thrown into the bathing-pool with the seaman’s chest, and I did so then to Jackson, wondering at its contents and how they were to be got at.
Jackson entered into the question warmly, explaining to me how and where to bore holes with a gimlet, and making two spiles for me to stop the holes with. As soon as he had done so, curiosity induced me to go down to the pool where the cask had been lying so long in about a foot and half water. By Jackson’s directions I took a pannikin with me, that I might bring him a specimen of the contents of the cask, if they should prove not to be water. I soon bored the hole above and below, following Jackson’s directions, and the liquor, which poured out in a small stream into the pannikin, was of a brown colour and very strong in odour, so strong, indeed, as to make me reel as I walked back to the rocks with the pannikin full of it. I then sat down, and after a time tasted it. I thought I had swallowed fire, for I had taken a good mouthful of it. “This cannot be what Jackson called spirits,” said I. “No one can drink this—what can it be?” Although I had not swallowed more than a table-spoonful of it, yet, combined with the fumes of the liquor which I had inhaled when drawing it off into the pannikin, the effect was to make my head swim, and I lay down on the rock and shut my eyes to recover myself. It ended in my falling asleep for many hours, for it was not much after noon when I went to the cask, and it was near sunset when I awoke, with an intense pain, in my head. It was some time before I could recollect where I was, or what had passed, but the pannikin full of liquor by my side first reminded me; and then perceiving how late it was, and how long I must have slept, I rose up, and taking the pannikin in my hand, I hastened to return to the cabin.
As I approached, I heard the voice of Jackson, whose hearing, since his blindness, I had observed, had become peculiarly acute.
“Is that you, Frank?”
“Yes,” replied I.
“And what has kept you so long?—how you have frightened me. God forgive me, but I thought that I was to be left and abandoned to starvation.”
“Why should you have thought that?” replied I.
“Because I thought that some way or another you must have been killed, and then I must have died, of course. I never was so frightened in my life, the idea of dying here all alone—it was terrible.”
It occurred to me at the time, that the alarm was all for himself, for he did not say a word about how sorry he should have been at any accident happening to me, but I made no remark, simply stating what had occurred, and my conviction that the contents of the cask were not drinkable.