All we were concerned about was the
magnanimous way in which he, so to speak, made us a present of
himself, giving us no more trouble to secure his treasure than as
if he had been a lifeless thing. We soon had him alongside,
finding, upon ranging him by the ship, that he was over seventy
feet long, with a breadth of bulk quite in proportion to such
a vast length.
Cutting-in commenced at once, for fine weather there was by no
means to be wasted, being of rare occurrence and liable at the
shortest notice to be succeeded by a howling gale. Our latest
acquisition, however, was of such gigantic proportions that the
decapitation alone bade fair to take us all night. A nasty cross
swell began to get up, too--a combination of north-westerly and
south-westerly which, meeting at an angle where the Straits
began, raised a curious "jobble," making the vessel behave in a
drunken, uncertain manner. Sailors do not mind a ship rolling or
pitching, any more than a rider minds the motion of his horse;
but when she does both at once, with no approach to regularity in
her movements, it makes them feel angry with her. What, then,
must our feelings have been under such trying conditions, with
that mountain of matter alongside to which so much sheer hard
labour had to be done, while the sky was getting greasy and the
wind beginning to whine in that doleful key which is the certain
prelude to a gale?
Everybody worked like Chinamen on a contract, as if there was no
such feeling as fatigue.
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