Chapter Fifty Four.
Thanksgiving.
Despondency cannot endure forever. Kind Nature has not ordained that it should be so. It may have its periods, longer or shorter as the case may be; but always to be succeeded by intervals, if not of absolute cheerfulness, at least of emotions less painful to endure.
About an hour after the going down of the sun, the spirits of those on board the Catamaran became partially freed from the weight that for some time had been pressing upon them.
Of coarse this change was attributable to some cause; and as it was a physical one, there could be no difficulty in tracing it.
It was simply the springing up of a breeze,—a fine breeze blowing steadily, and to the west,—the very direction in which it was desirous they should make way.
And they did make way; the Catamaran, in spite of the terrible “stab” she had received, scudding through the water, as if to show that the assault of the sword-fish had in no way disabled her.
Motion has always a soothing effect upon anyone suffering from despondent spirits; more especially when the movement is being made in the right direction. A boat stationary in the water, or drifting the wrong way against the stroke of the rower,—a railway carriage at a stand, or gliding back to the platform, contrary to the direction in which the traveller intends to go,—such experiences always produce a feeling of irksome uneasiness. When either begins to progress in its proper course,—no matter how slowly,—the unpleasant feeling instantly passes away; for we know that we are going “onward!”
“Onward!” a word to cheer the drooping spirit,—a glorious word for the despondent.
It was not that anyone on board the Catamaran had the slightest idea that that breeze would waft them to land; or even last long enough to bear them many leagues over the ocean. It was the thought that they were making progress in the right course,—going onward,—simply that thought that cheered them.