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The great height of the ruined remains of the piles of houses rendered it impossible to have them removed by the ordinary means. After several fruitless attempts with chains and ropes, worked by capstans, to pull them down, gunpowder was at last resorted to.
Bob, we've been long enough aboard ship to know the value of a song in producing unity of action. Take the tune from me." Suiting the action to the word, Jack gave forth, at the top of his voice, one or two of those peculiarly nautical howls wherewith seamen are wont to constrain windlasses and capstans to creak, and anchors to let go their hold.
"It would be worth a trial!" cried Ardan, so full of his subject as not to notice the Captain's jeering tone; "attraction once destroyed, there is an end forever to all loads, packs and burdens! How the poor omnibus horses would rejoice! Adieu forever to all cranes, derricks, capstans, jack-screws, and even hotel-elevators! We could dispense with all ladders, door steps, and even stair-cases!"
This done, the capstans were manned again, and with the rising tide the brig raised to her proper position, and secured for the night, but hauled in as close to the shore as was possible, with the consequence that though the water rose through the untouched leak considerably, it never reached so high within as the point it had occupied with the pumps hard at work.
As for Bernard, he helped her about the ship like a brother, as she moved lightly around, with her sylph-like little form, among the ropes and capstans. Melissa Hked to be helped, she said; she didn't believe one bit in woman's rights; no, indeed; she was a great deal too fond of being taken care of for that.
The pier was musical with the wash of the sea, the creaking of capstans and windlasses, and the airy fluttering of little vanes and sails. The rough, sea-bleached boulders of which the pier was made, and the whiter boulders of the shore, were brown with drying nets.
“Leap!” commanded Glaucon; “spring as the mast rises on the next wave.” “I cannot forsake her,” called back the man, pointing to the woman, who lay with flying hair between the capstans, helpless and piteous now that her lover was no longer near. “I will provide for her. Leap!” Glaucon lifted the woman in his arms. He took a manner of pride in showing the Barbarian his skill.
Four lackeys had tried in vain, pulling at them as they would have pulled capstans; and yet all this did not awaken him. They had hacked off his boots in fragments, and his legs had fallen back upon the bed. They then cut off the rest of his clothes, carried him to a bath, in which they let him soak a considerable time.
Until this moment a breath less silence pervaded the watching multitude; and nothing was heard among the working party on the Anglesea side but the steady tramp of the men at the capstans, the shrill music of the fife, and the occasional order to "Hold on!" or "Go along!"
Great rusty iron rings and mooring-chains, capstans, and fragments of old masts and spars, choke up the way; hardy rough-weather boats, and seamen's clothing, flutter in the little harbour or are drawn out on the sunny stones to dry; on the parapet of the rude pier, a few amphibious-looking fellows lie asleep, with their legs dangling over the wall, as though earth or water were all one to them, and if they slipped in, they would float away, dozing comfortably among the fishes; the church is bright with trophies of the sea, and votive offerings, in commemoration of escape from storm and shipwreck.
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