They carried the body to the gangway where the lanterns were, and I went with them and they put one end of the plank on the top of the rail and two of them held the other end, ready to tilt it. I think all the seamen had drawn together to view this midnight burial. Antonio and Jorge were close to a lantern. They sometimes crossed themselves, and their eyes gleamed and restlessly rolled. They seemed heartily frightened. The others stood stolid and staring, some in shadow, some touched by the lantern beams. All hands bared their heads when the corpse came to the gangway.
Had this funeral happened in daylight I should have ordered the topsail to be backed. I agree with those who hold that the ship’s way should be stopped when the body is launched. It would have been, however, but the idlest of ceremonies to back the topsail in this deep midnight hour. There was besides a large sea running, the fresh wind was off the quarter, and the brig would have needed a shift of the helm to have got an effectual stand out of her backed canvas.
Cold, oh how bitterly cold did that night grow on a sudden with the presence of that body, pale on its plank in the lantern light! A wilder cry sounded in the wind, a deeper dye entered the darkness. I prayed aloud briefly, but not for the hearing of the men: the hiss of the sweeping water alongside drowned my voice.
“Launch!” I cried.
As the canvas figure fled like a wreath of white smoke from the rail a sunbright flash of fire threw out the whole brig: the roar of a gun followed.
At that instant—at the instant of the explosion of the carronade—and while the two fellows who had tilted the body paused for a moment or two, grasping the end of the plank, a dark form seemed to spring from the deck at my feet; it gained the plank in a bound, and went overboard.
“Der dok!” roared one of the Dutchmen.
The second gun was exploded with a deafening roar.
“Was that Galloon?” I shouted.
“It was, sir,” answered two or three voices.