I Shall
Certainly Have To Call All Hands, I Conclude; Then Conclude The Next
Instant To Hang On A Little Longer.
Maybe this is the end of it,
and I shall have called them for nothing.
It is better to let them
sleep. I hold the Snark down to her task, and from out of the
darkness, at right angles, comes a deluge of rain accompanied by
shrieking wind. Then everything eases except the blackness, and I
rejoice in that I have not called the men.
No sooner does the wind ease than the sea picks up. The combers are
breaking now, and the boat is tossing like a cork. Then out of the
blackness the gusts come harder and faster than before. If only I
knew what was up there to windward in the blackness! The Snark is
making heavy weather of it, and her lee-rail is buried oftener than
not. More shrieks and snorts of wind. Now, if ever, is the time to
call the men. I WILL call them, I resolve. Then there is a burst
of rain, a slackening of the wind, and I do not call. But it is
rather lonely, there at the wheel, steering a little world through
howling blackness. It is quite a responsibility to be all alone on
the surface of a little world in time of stress, doing the thinking
for its sleeping inhabitants. I recoil from the responsibility as
more gusts begin to strike and as a sea licks along the weather rail
and splashes over into the cockpit.
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