Evening was just closing in, by that indescribable feeling of in the torrid air always experienced at sea near the Equator when the sun is about to disappear. The men in the “crow’s nests” were anxiously watching the declining , whose would be the signal for their release from their tedious watch. But to the of every foremast hand, before the sun had quite reached the horizon, the officer up at the mainmast head, taking a final comprehensive sweep with his glasses all around, raised the thrilling cry of “Blo—o—o—o—w.” And despite the lateness of the hour, in less than ten minutes four boats were being driven in the direction of the just-sighted whale. Forgetting for awhile their discontent at the before them, the crews vigorously to reach their objective, although not a man of them but would have rejoiced to lose sight of him. It was not so to be. At another time he would probably have been startled by the clang of the as they turned in the rowlocks, but now he seemed to have lost his powers of , allowing us to come up with him and him with comparative ease. The moment that he felt the of the keen iron, all his slothfulness seemed[342] to vanish, and without giving one of the other boats a chance to get fast also, he milled round to windward, and exerting all his vast strength, rushed off into the night that came up to meet us like the opening of some dim portal into the unknown. Some little time was consumed in our preparations for the next stage of our , during which the darkness came down upon us and shut us in with our , out our ship and the other boats from the horizon left to us, as if they had never been. By some no compass was in our boat, and, a rare occurrence in those , the sky was so that we could not see the stars. Also there was but little wind, our swift at the will of the whale alone being responsible for the breeze we felt. On, on we went in silence except for the roar of the parted waters on either hand, and unable to see anything but the gleam ahead whenever the great mammal broke water to . Presently the headlong rush through the gloom began to tell upon everybody’s nerves, and we hoped, almost prayed for a slackening of the speed kept up by the monster we had fastened ourselves to. The only man who appeared unmoved was the second mate, who was in charge. He stood in the bows as if carved in stone, one hand grasping his long lance and the other resting on his , a stern figure whose only sign of life was his unconscious balancing to the lively motion of the boat. Always a mystery to us of the crew, he seemed much more so now, his inscrutable[343] figure dimly blotched against the gloom ahead, and all our lives in his hand. For a year we had been in daily with him, yet we felt that we knew no more of the man himself than on the first day of our meeting. A strong, silent man, who never cursed us as the others did, because his lightest word carried more weight than their of , and withal a man who came as near the seaman’s ideal of courage, resourcefulness, and as we could conceive possible. Again and again, as we sped onwards through the dark, each of us after his own fashion analysed that man’s character in a weary purposeless round of confused thought, through the of which shot with the phrase, “a lost boat.” How long we had thus been driving blindly on none of us could tell—no doubt the time appeared enormously prolonged—but when at last the ease-up came we were all stiff with our long of position. All, that is, but Mr. Neville our chief, who, as if in broad day within a mile of the ship, gave all the necessary orders for the attack. Again we were baffled, for in spite of his run the whale began to sound. Down, down he went in hasteless fashion, never pausing for an instant, though we kept all the strain on the line that was possible, until the last of our 300 left the tub, slithered through the ’s fingers round the loggerhead, and disappeared. Up flew the boat’s head with a shock that sent us all flying in different directions, then all was silent. Only for a minute.[344] The calm grave tones of Mr. Neville broke the spell by saying, “Make yourselves as comfortable as you can, lads, we can do nothing till daylight but watch for the ship.” We made an almost whispered response, and began our watch. But it was like trying to peer through the walls of an unlit cellar, so closely did the darkness us in. Presently down came the rain, followed by much wind, until, notwithstanding the , our teeth with cold. Of course we were in no danger from the sea, for except in the rare hurricanes there is seldom any wind in those regions rising to the force of a . But the night was very long. Nor did our tend to make our hard lot any easier.  
So low did we feel that when at last the day dawned we could not appreciate the significance of that heavenly sight. As the darkness fled, however, hope revived, and eager eyes searched every portion of the gradually lightening ring of blue of which we were the tiny centre. Slowly, fatefully, the fact was driven home to our hearts that what we had feared was come to pass; the ship was nowhere to be seen. More than that, we all knew that in that most unfrequented stretch of ocean months might pass without signs of of any kind. There were six pounds of biscuits in one keg and three gallons of water in another, sufficient perhaps at utmost need to keep the six of us alive for a week. We looked in one another’s faces and saw the fear of death plainly ; we looked at Mr. Neville’s face and[345] were strengthened. Speaking in his usual tones, but with a deeper inflexion in them, he gave orders for the sail to be set, and making an approximate course by the sun, we to the N.W. Even the of movement was soon denied us, for as the sun rose the wind sank, the sky overhead cleared and the sea . A biscuit each and half-a-pint of water was served out to us and we made our first meal, not without secretly endeavouring to calculate how many more still remained to us. At Mr. Neville’s suggestion we sheltered ourselves as much as possible from the fierce glare of the sun, and to keep off thirst poured sea-water over one another at frequent . Our worst trial for the present was inaction, for a desire to be doing—something—no matter what, kept our nerves and so that it was all we could do to keep still.
 
After an hour or two of almost unbroken silence Mr. Neville , huskily at first, but as he went on his voice rang and . “M............