Having climbed into the fore-rigging, however, so as to have a good look at the boat and its occupants as we neared them, I was quite as quick as the skipper to notice what had happened, having, indeed, foreseen the contingency before it occurred.
So, ere Masters or any of the other men could stir a hand, having made up my mind what to do, I had seized hold of part of the slack of the line that remained inboard and, plunging into the sea, swam towards the boat.
A couple of strokes, combined with the forward impetus of my leap overboard, took me up to the little craft, and in a jiffey I had grasped the gunwale aft and clambered within her, securing the end of the line I had round one of the thwarts at once, amid the ringing cheers of the skipper and my shipmates in the old barquey, who proceeded to haul us up alongside without further delay, tugging away at the tar rope I had hitched on, yo-heave-hoing and hurrahing in one and the same breath right lustily!
So smart were they, so instantaneous had been the action of the moment during the episode, that we were close in to the ship’s side and under her conning, immediately below the port end of the bridge, where the skipper stood leaning over the rail and surveying operations, before I had time actually to look round so as to have a nearer view of the unfortunate men whom we had so providentially rescued.
When I did though, one glance was enough.
I was horror stricken at the sight that met my eyes.
The man whom I had observed when we were yet some distance off to be lying huddled up in the bows motionless, as if dying or already dead, I now saw had received a horrible wound on the top of his head that had very nearly smashed in the skull, besides almost severing one of his ears which was hanging from the cheek bone, attached by a mere scrap of skin, the bottom boards of the boat near him being stained with blood that had flowed from the cut, and his hair likewise matted together with gore. Oh, it was horrible to see! He was not dead, however, as I had thought, but only in a state of stupor, breathing heavily and making a strange stertorous sound as if snoring.
His fellow-sufferer aft, who did not appear to have suffered so much as his comrade, had seemingly swooned from exhaustion or exposure; as, on my putting my arm round him and lifting up his bent head, the man opened his eyes and murmured something faintly in some foreign lingo—Spanish, I think it was; at any rate a language I did not understand.
But I was unable to notice anything beyond these details, which I grasped in that one hurried glance; for as I was in the act of raising up the poor chap in the stern-sheets, the skipper hailed me from the bridge above.