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"It's only a volcano," said he. "I knew there was one hereabouts, but thought it was extinct. Up, there, and furl topgallant sails! We'll likely have a breeze, and it's well to be ready." As he spoke, a shower began to fall, which, we quickly observed, was not rain, but fine ashes. As we were many miles distant from the volcano, these must have been carried to us from it by the wind.
The captain had housed topgallant masts and lashed his guns inboard; yet she rolled so that you would not have trusted a cat on her storm-washed decks.
Her maintopmast is reefed a third down; we have been long without topgallantmasts, being necessitated to take the topgallant rigging for running gear."
There was really more danger in this than in any lack of seakindliness on the part of the vessel. Each time she ran away from a treacherous-looking breaker, the captain would pat the topgallant bulwarks and speak words of touching tenderness as though he was communing with a little child. The further they ran north, the bigger the seas became.
One half of every object, shipping, houses, trees, and hills, was gloriously illuminated; but even as we looked, the lower part of the town gradually sank into darkness, and faded from our sight the deepening gloom cast by the high bank above us, like the dark shadow of a bad spirit, gradually crept on, and on, and extended farther and farther; the sailing water fowl in regular lines, no longer made the water flash up like flame; the russet mantle of eve was fast extending over the entire hemisphere; the glancing minarets, and the tallest trees, and the topgallant yards and masts of the shipping, alone flashed back the dying effulgence of the glorious orb, which every moment grew fainter and fainter, and redder and redder, until it shaded into purple, and the loud deep bell of the convent of La Merced swung over the still waters, announcing the arrival of even song and the departure of day.
Haul down and clew up, fore and aft; in with everything. Settle away your peak and main halliards, and let's get this big mainsail snug under its cover the first thing. In main-topmast staysail. Let go the topgallant and topsail halliards, and clew up and furl the sails. Man the jib and staysail downhauls, let go the halliards, haul down. Lay out there, for'ard, and stow those jibs.
The poor fellow evidently believed more in his god than I did in mine; for here he was in a moment of danger, as he thought, praying for help, while I, who had almost lost my life when I so nearly escaped tumbling from the topgallant yard only a moment or so since, had thoughtlessly forgotten Him who had saved me! I think of this now, but I didn't then.
I was on the topgallant forecastle all the time, superintending the operations there, and as soon as I saw the cable swinging with the heave of the ship, "Anchor's aweigh, sir!" I sang out. "Thank you, Mr Chester. Now put your helm hard-a-port, my man; over with it smartly. She has stern-way upon her and is driving in toward the shore. Now she pays off. Trim aft your lee headsheets, forward there.
She carried a short topgallant forecastle forward, and a full poop aft, reaching to within about twenty-five feet from the mainmast; and between these two structures the bulwarks had been completely swept away, leaving only a jagged stump of a stanchion here and there protruding above the covering-board.
Well, I saw there was a squall rising to windward, but boy like, instead of shortening sail, and taking down royals and topgallant masts, and making all snug, I just braved it out, and prepared to meet the blast with every inch of canvas set. "Yes, Sir," said I, "the twelfth." "Dear me," said he, "poor boy, that is my fault.
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