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High in the air the tall crest would dip slowly, as if it bowed with manifest reluctance to the inevitable. The sawyers would drop lightly from their springboards, crying: "Tim-ber-r-r-r!" The earthward swoop of the upper boughs would hasten till the air was full of a whistling, whishing sound.
This was as the man rolled away sailor fashion, and emitting a crackling whishing sound as he made for the vessel's bows, where he received some order from his captain which sent him to the covered-in hatchway of the forecastle, where he slowly disappeared into a kind of haze, half water, half smoke, for several of the water-bound crew had given up the chewing of their tobacco to indulge in pipes.
And then once more the slow, careful steering was kept up, Mr Brooke's hand guiding mine from time to time, while now for the most part we steered to follow the distant whishing sound made by the wind in the junk's great matting-sails. All at once, when a strange, drowsy feeling was creeping over me, I was startled back into wakefulness by Mr Brooke, who said in an angry whisper "Who's that?"
When I passed outside, however, and pressed down the levers which controlled it, I knew at once by the whishing sound that there was a slight leakage, which allowed a regurgitation of water through one of the side cylinders. An examination showed that one of the india-rubber bands which was round the head of a driving-rod had shrunk so as not quite to fill the socket along which it worked.
As he stood listening to the soft whishing roar of the storm, he thought he heard the deep bay of Queen's voice. Holding his breath, he listened again. In the pause of the storm he heard, and distinctly this time, that deep musical note. "They're digging out a wolf," he said. "They'll get tired and come back soon."
And all this while the waggon jolted on over the rough ground or rolled smoothly over the flat plain, crushing down the thick buffalo-grass, or smashing some succulent, thorny cactus with a peculiar whishing sound that seemed to penetrate far through the silence of the night.
A sliding door or panel at one end was lifted up the body deposited within, on a shelf the door reclosed a spring a the side touched a sudden 'whishing, sighing sound heard from within; and lo! at the other end of the machine the lid fell down, and a small handful of smouldering dust dropped into a 'patera' placed to receive it. To this little dust He gave form and life and soul.
"I see her, my lad," cried Hickathrift; and he tried to give the boat a good thrust by means of his pole; but though he touched bottom it was soft peat, and his pole went down, and the next moment they were crashing through the top of a willow, with the boat tilting up on one side and threatening to fill; but just as the water began to pour in, there was a whishing and crackling noise as it passed over the obstacle and swung clear, with Hickathrift holding on to a branch with all his might.
The fact did not occur to me that I was a mere boy and he a muscular man, for I'm afraid I had plenty of conceit, and, drawing in a long breath, I lifted the ladder straight up easily enough, took a couple of steps in the right direction, and then felt to my horror that the strength of my arms was as nothing as soon as the balance ceased to be preserved, for in spite of my efforts the top of the ladder began to go over slowly, then faster and faster, then there was a sharp whishing crash as the bough of a pear-tree was literally cut off and a bump and a sharp crack.
I'd give you a lift, only I can't, for I'm in rotten anchorage, and we mustn't get adrift." About a minute passed, in which little was heard but the whishing of the water through the leaves and twigs, and the sound of hard breathing. Then Joe spoke again "I don't want to hurry you, my lad, but if you think you can manage it I'd say, begin." "I'm ready now, Joe," said the boy faintly.
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