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Updated: May 3, 2025
The bitterness of death remained behind as we passed out of the baneful Bights. Wind and wave were dead against us, yet I greatly enjoyed the gradual emerging of the sun through his shroud of "smokes;" the increasing consciousness that a moon and stars really exist; the soft blue haze of the sky, and the coolness of 73deg. F. at 6 A.M. in the captain's cabin. I had also time to enjoy these charms.
Next, two stout rope strops were passed through the ringbolts by which the boat was suspended from the tackles and one bight passed through the other and secured in place by a well- greased toggle, or piece of wood capable of being easily and quickly withdrawn; and finally the bights thus formed were passed over the hooks of the blocks, the tackles, were boused taut and made fast again, and the temporary supports were cast off, thus leaving the boat once more suspended by the tackles.
However, as I perceived that he had worked himself into a perfect fury, up I went, and to the topgallant-mast-head, embracing the royal pole with one arm, and standing on the bights of the rigging. My nether apparel, in performing this feat, appeared as if it had been employed in wiping up a bucket of spilled tar. But I was not long to remain unmolested in my stand on the high and giddy mast.
I saw two of them force a twisted loop of rope into its mouth, and the two bights of the loop were brought together at the back of the hound's neck. Then a third man thrust a thick walking-stick through the two loops.
She passed the Battery and up the East River, craft of all kinds getting out of her way, for it was obvious that something was wrong with her, until, rounding slowly to a starboard wheel, with canvas rattling and running-gear in bights, she headed straight for a slip partly filled with canal-boats.
Then, having got the first gun on deck already prepared in Port Royal dockyard, by being encased in a stout cylindrical packing of planks we passed the bights of our two hawsers round it, one at each end, and with all hands tailing on except one, whom we set to watch as a sentinel proceeded to parbuckle it up the face of the cliff.
The coast-line curved in bights and promontories, with here and there a cluster of boats, while the gulls and wild geese were busy on the shore, and the waves rolled in in small curling ripples which glistened in the' clear sunshine. Per soon caught up Madeleine, for she went slowly that day.
Between the black worm-eaten headlands there are little bights and havens, well screened from the wind and the commotion of the external sea, where the sand and weeds look up into the gazer's face from a depth of tranquil water, and the sea-birds, screaming and flickering from the ruined crags, alone disturb the silence and the sunshine.
A dozen men-of-war are gliding majestically out of port, their long buntings streaming from the top-gallant masts, calling on the skulking Frenchman to come forth from his bights and bays; and what looms upon us yonder from the fog-bank in the east? a gallant frigate towing behind her the long low hull of a crippled privateer, which but three short days ago had left Dieppe to skim the sea, and whose crew of ferocious hearts are now cursing their imprudence in an English hold.
Sharp now plainly counted fifteen human forms as they scrambled back towards the reef, some hanging by their arms, some half in the water, and others lying along the chains, as best they might. Mr. Blunt having loosened the chains, so as to let their bights fall into the sea, the ship slowly drifted astern, and rode by her cables.
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