“Will your shrieks and oaths give us water?” Holdsworth continued bitterly. “You are not more thirsty than I, nor this poor lady, from whom you have not heard one syllable of complaint since she was handed into the boat!”
He turned to her with a look of deep compassion.
“Try to sustain your courage under this awful trial,” he exclaimed. “Our position is not yet hopeless. There is no sea more largely navigated than the Atlantic, by vessels bound to all parts of the world, and I say it is almost inevitable that we should fall in with a ship soon.”
She forced a wan smile for answer, but did not speak; merely put her hand on her child’s shoulder and drew him to her.
As the morning advanced the heat of the sun increased, and the rays seemed to absorb the light breeze out of the atmosphere; the sea turned glassy, and by noon the boat was becalmed. Meanwhile, Winyard remained doggedly buried in the bows of the boat, sucking his dry lips, with despair legibly written upon his countenance. Johnson appeared to find relief by plunging his arm in the water and moistening his head and face. The very boat took a white, baked, thirsty aspect; and the heat made the paint upon her exhale in a faint and sickly smell.
When the afternoon was waning, Winyard got up and crept stealthily to the after-part of the boat. Holdsworth kept his eyes steadily upon him. His intention, however, was no more than to take up the pannikin, which he snatched at hastily, as though fearing that his purpose would be frustrated. He then hastened forward and filled the vessel from one of the kegs.
“Don’t drink it!” exclaimed Holdsworth; “it will increase your thirst.”
But the man, pointing to his throat, swallowed the briny draught hastily, then put the pannikin down with a sigh of relief and with a face cleared of something of its peculiar expression of pain.
Johnson seized the pannikin, meaning to follow Winyard’s example. Holdsworth entreated him to desist. “The salt will madden you!” he exclaimed. He had scarcely said this, when Winyard began to roll his body about, uttering short, sharp cries.
Immediately afterwards he vomited, his face turned slate colour, and they thought he would expire. Holdsworth drained some rum into his mouth, and poured sea-water from the pannikin in long streams over his head. This somewhat revived him; but he lay groaning and cursing, and clutching at the sides of the boat with his finger-nails for many minutes.