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The moon was whitening the sleeping Pacific when Edith and I stood looking over the taffrail as the Messenger of Light swept on her course. From nearby came the voice of Professor Herndon relating his experiences to a missionary who was returning from the Marquesas. A soft island melody was wafted from the fo'c'stle, and the night was alive with all the witchery of the tropics.
A moment afterwards the sailors were in the boat, rowing towards the Narcissus. Their song came back across the water: "... O you A.B. sailor-man, Wet your whistle while you can, For the piping of the bugle calls you 'ome! 'Ome 'ome 'ome, Calls you on to your fo'c'stle 'ome!"
I noticed the name on his starn; but there warn't no name of a port where he hails from, for the simple reason that he hails from nowhere in particular. Besides, a man with half an eye could tell by looking at that craft that she's strong-handed. Depend on't, Harry, there's too many hammocks in her fo'c'stle for an honest trader.
Charlie disappeared in the galley, supper was cooked, and eaten upon deck under the conflagration of the sunset; the lights were set, the Chinamen foregathered in the fo'c'stle head, smoking opium, and by eight o'clock the routine of the day was at an end. So the time passed. In a short time Wilbur could not have said whether the day was Wednesday or Sunday.
"Fo'c'stle of a fishing schooner!" he announced, and then opened his eyes to prove that he was correct. He looked out into a three-cornered room occupied by a three-cornered table, and that ran as far back as the foremast. Above, fastened to a huge square beam, hung a chain-lamp so swiveled that it kept itself level however much the schooner kicked and wriggled.
She turned and saw nearing the shore from the Rue d'Egypte a half-dozen sailors, singing cheerily: "Get you on, get you on, get you on, Get you on to your fo'c'stle'ome; Leave your lassies, leave your beer, For the bugle what you 'ear Pipes you on to your fo'c'stle 'ome 'Ome 'ome 'ome, Pipes you on to your fo'c'stle 'ome." Guida drew near.
With head down and eyebrows hiding his eyes, with trembling hands that tore the envelope, Philip took out the letter and read it in passages broken, blurred, smudged, as by the smoke of a fo'c'stle lamp. "Deerest peat i am gettin that much better... i am that happy and comforbel... sometimes i am longing for a sight of the lil ones swate face... no more at present... ure own trew wife."
By this time the men were crowding aft, the sentry among them, when the lieutenant of the watch, thinking maybe there was going to be a mutiny, or something of that sort, sings out and axes what we were about. "`Sir, answers the sentry, who was bold enough now; `there's the ghost of Mr Carcass a walking the fo'c'stle.
The yacht seemed to be veneered with a soft luminous paint that gave us the appearance of a ghostly ship skimming over a ghostly ocean. At the top of the fo'c'stle ladder I found a native stretched full length and sobbing mightily. He walloped his head against the planks when I endeavoured to get him upon his feet, and the sobs shook his frame. "What's the matter?" I asked. "Toni! Toni!
Still the schooner lifted; objects on deck began to slide aft; the oil in the deck-tubs washed over; then, as there came a wild scrambling of the Chinese crew up the fo'c'stle hatch, she settled again gradually at first, then, with an abrupt lurch that almost threw him from his feet, regained her level. Moran met him in the waist. Charlie came running aft. "What was that? Are we grounding?
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