196 THIE

were dying, and that, not counting me, left three as yet well and able to get about.

This man Archer, when the boatswain and his companions went forward, came out of the forccastle, and drank at the scuttle- butt in the waist. He walked unsteadily, with that cffort after statcliness which s peculiar to tipsy sailors ; his eyes wandered, and he found some difficulty in hitting the bunghole with the dipper. Yet he was a civil sort of man when sober ; I had occa- sionally chatted with him during his tricks at the wheel; and, feeling the need of someone to talk to about our frightful situation, I walked up to him, and asked how the sick men did.

“Dying fast,” he answered, steadying himself by lcaning against the scuttle-butt, “and a-ravin' like sereech-owls.”

“What's to be done, Archer? "

“Oh, God alonc He knows 7 answered the man, and here he put his knuckles into his eyes, and began to cry and sob.

“Is it possible that this calm can last much longer? "

It may last sixoweeks,” he answerced, whimpering. “CDown when the wind's drawed away by the sun, it may take six weceks alore it comes on to blow. Six weeks of calm down here ain’t thought nothen of,” and here he burst out blubber- g again.

“Where do you get your liquor from 27 said T.

“Oh, don't talk of 1t, don't talk of 1t 1" he replicd, with a maudlin shake of the head.

“ Drinking ‘Il not help you,

“yvou'll all be the hkchier to the malady for drinking. This is asort of time, [ should thmk when a man most wants his senses. A breeze may come, and we owfht Lo d(,mdc where to steer the barque to. The vessel's under all plain sail, too, and here we are, four men and a uscless passenger, should it come on to blow suddenly——"

“We didn’t sign on undcr you," he inter- rupted, with a tlpsy scowl, “and as ye ain't no good cither as satlor or doctor, you can l\gq) your blooming sarmons to yourscl{ till thev're asked for.”

[ had now not only to fear the chelera but to dread the men. My mental distrcx‘s wis beyond all power of words to convey I wonder it did not quickly drive me ua/y and hurry me overboard. T lurked 1n the cabin to be out of sight of the fellows, and all the while my imagination was tor- menting me with the first pangs of the

said I catch

STRAND

MAGAZINE.

cholera, and cevery minute I was believing I had the mortal malady. Sometimes T would creep up the companion steps and cautiously peer around, and always I beheld the same dead, faint bluc surface of sea stretching like an ocean in a dream into the faint mdcfinable distanees. DBut shocking as that calm was to me I very well knew there was nothing wonderful or preter- natural in it. Our forctoot five days before had struck the cquatorial zone called the Doldrums, and at a period of the year when a fortnight or cven a month of atmospheric lifclessness might be as confidently looked for as the rising and setting of the sun.

At nine o'clock that night T was sitting at the cabin table with biscuit and a little weak brandy and water before me, when I was hailed by someone at the open skylight above. It was Dblack night, though the sky was glorious with stars: the moon did not risc Gl after cleven. 1 had lighted the cabin lamp, and the sheen of 1t was upon the face of Archer,

“The two men are dead and gone,” said he, *and now the bo’sun and Bill arc down. There's Jim dead drunk in his hammock. i can't stand the cries of sick men. What with liquor and pain, the air below sullo- cates me. L.et me come aft, sir, and keep along with you. I'm sober now. Oh, Chr ls[ have mercy upon me ! ItUs my turn next, ain't it 7"

[ passed a glass of brandy to him through the skylight, then joined him on deck, and told him that the two dead bodies must be thrown overboard, and the sick men looked to. For some time he refused to go for- ward with me, saying that he was aheady poisoncd and deadly sick, and a (]3111(* mai, and that T had no right to expect that onc dying man should wait upon another. IHowever, T was determined to turn the dead out of the ship in any case, for 1n frecing the vessel of the remains of the victims might lic my salvation. Ilc con- sented to help me at last, and we went 1nto

the forccastle and between us got the bodics out of their bunks and dropped

the rail. The boat- men lay eroaning and writhing and crying for water ; cursing at intervals, A\ coil of black smoke went up from the lamp-flamc to the blackened beam

them, weighted, over sywain and the other

under which the light was burning. The atmosphere was horrible. I bade Archer

help me to carry a couple of mattresses on to the forecastle, and we got the sick men through the hatch, and they lay there n