us with a slight friendly toss of our boat. Far away, where the
brig had been, an angry white stain undulating on the surface of
steely-gray waters, shot with gleams of green, diminished swiftly,
without a hiss, like a patch of pure snow melting in the sun. And
the great stillness after this initiation into the sea's implacable
hate seemed full of dread thoughts and shadows of disaster.

"Gone!" ejaculated from the depths of his chest my bowman in a
final tone. He spat in his hands, and took a better grip on his
oar. The captain of the brig lowered his rigid arm slowly, and
looked at our faces in a solemnly conscious silence, which called
upon us to share in his simple-minded, marvelling awe. All at once
he sat down by my side, and leaned forward earnestly at my boat's
crew, who, swinging together in a long, easy stroke, kept their
eyes fixed upon him faithfully.

"No ship could have done so well," he addressed them firmly, after
a moment of strained silence, during which he seemed with trembling
lips to seek for words fit to bear such high testimony. "She was
small, but she was good. I had no anxiety. She was strong. Last
voyage I had my wife and two children in her. No other ship could
have stood so long the weather she had to live through for days and
days before we got dismasted a fortnight ago. She was fairly worn
out, and that's all. You may believe me. She lasted under us for
days and days, but she could not last for ever. It was long
enough. I am glad it is over. No better ship was ever left to
sink at sea on such a day as this."

He was competent to pronounce the funereal oration of a ship, this
son of ancient sea-folk, whose national existence, so little