“Little Will’m,” said the sailor, looking down at the boy, and speaking in gentle tones, “you’d better spread the sail under ye, and get some sleep. There be no use in both o’ us keeping awake. I’ll watch till it gets dark, an’ then I’ll join you. Go to sleep, lad! go to sleep!”
William was too wearied to make objection. Drawing the skirt of the sail over the raft, he lay down upon it, and found sleep almost as soon is he had composed himself into the attitude to enjoy it.
The sailor remained standing erect; now sweeping the horizon with his glance, now bending his eye restlessly upon the water as it rippled along the edge of the raft, and again returning to that distant scrutiny,—so oft repeated, so oft unrewarded.
Thus occupied, he passed the interval of twilight,—short in these latitudes; nor did he terminate his vigil until darkness had descended upon the deep.
It promised to be a dark, moonless night. Only a few feebly gleaming stars, thinly scattered over the firmament, enabled him to distinguish the canopy of the sky from the waste of waters that surrounded him. Even a ship under full spread of canvas could not have been seen, though passing at a cable’s length from the raft.
It was idle to continue the dreary vigil; and having arrived at this conviction, the sailor stretched himself alongside his slumbering companion, and, like the latter, was soon relieved from his long-protracted anxiety by the sweet oblivion of sleep.