fear for my own life like that which seized me for your
ship, lest, disarmed and disabled, shaken loose from her 30
ruler’s hand, she should give way under the great sea that
was rising then. Three long nights of storm the south
wind swept me over the vast wilderness of convulsed
ocean. Hardly at last, at the fourth dawn, I looked out
aloft upon Italy from the crest of the wave. Stroke by 35
stroke I was swimming to shore; and now I was just
laying hold on safety, had not the savage natives come
on me, sword in hand, clogged as I was with my dripping