the deck, he also was in the presence of deity. 

 The noise was too great for their voices to be heard, but each knew that the other was alive, and they lay side by side for two hours, contriving to save their reason by the sense of each other's nearness. 

 After that time had passed they were able to crawl into shelter. Here they found others of the crew in varying states of terror and stupefaction. But it was now getting lighter, and the wind was blowing less. The worst was over. It seemed very remarkable that the Margaret Carey was still afloat. 

 In two hours more the wind had died. An hour after that they saw the sun again and the ship kept her course as if nothing had occurred. Indeed, nothing had occurred to speak of, in Mr. Thompson's opinion, except that two members of the crew had fetched away and gone overboard, and they could ill afford to lose them, being undermanned already. 

 It was now the boy's duty to wait on the Old Man in the cabin. This was more to his taste than having to lend a hand in the port watch. He was not the least use on deck, and was assured by everybody that he never would be, but in the cabin he was very alert and diligent, and less inefficient than might have been expected. He was really very quick in some ways, and he laid himself out to please the Old Man with his cheerful willingness, not that he felt particularly willing or cheerful either, but he knew that was the only way to save his skin. At any rate, Sailor was not going back into the port watch if he could possibly help it. 

 For such a boy as he, with an eager, imaginative brain always asking questions of its profoundly ignorant owner, the cabin was a far more interesting place than the half-deck or the forecastle. There was a measure of society in the cabin; Mr. Thompson and Mr. MacFarlane sometimes fraternized with the Old Man, after supper, and their discourse when they turned to and smoked their pipes and discussed a noggin of the Old Man's "pertickler," of which they were great connoisseurs, was very well worth hearing. 

 Henry Harper found that when the Old Man was not upset by the weather—which generally brought on a drinking attack—he was human more or less. Although prone to outbursts of fury, in which anything might occur, he was by no means all bad. In fact, he was rather by way of being religious when the elements were in his favor. When at a loose end he would read a chapter of the Bible, which was of the large family order, adorned the cabin 

 Prev. P 46/347 next