I dare say a dozen of others agreed to do so, and
I thought we should have been quite a party. Yet, when I brought up
my rug about seven bells, there was no one to be seen but the watch.
That chimerical terror of good night-air, which makes men close their
windows, list their doors, and seal themselves up with their own
poisonous exhalations, had sent all these healthy workmen down below.
One would think we had been brought up in a fever country; yet in
England the most malarious districts are in the bedchambers.
I felt saddened at this defection, and yet half-pleased to have the
night so quietly to myself. The wind had hauled a little ahead on
the starboard bow, and was dry but chilly. I found a shelter near
the fire-hole, and made myself snug for the night.
The ship moved over the uneven sea with a gentle and cradling
movement. The ponderous, organic labours of the engine in her bowels
occupied the mind, and prepared it for slumber. From time to time a
heavier lurch would disturb me as I lay, and recall me to the obscure
borders of consciousness; or I heard, as it were through a veil, the
clear note of the clapper on the brass and the beautiful sea-cry,
'All's well!' I know nothing, whether for poetry or music, that can
surpass the effect of these two syllables in the darkness of a night
at sea.
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