covered me up well with several blankets, and there I lay with my face
turned from the light of the swinging lamp, and scarcely moved hand or
foot throughout the dismal and stormy night.

For it was very stormy and dismal as soon as we were out of Southampton
waters, and in the rush and swirl of the Channel. I did not fall asleep
for an instant. I do not suppose I should have slept had the Channel
been, as it is sometimes, smooth as a mill-pond, and there had been no
clamorous hissing and booming of waves against the frail planks, which I
could touch with my hand. I could see nothing of the storm, but I could
hear it: and the boat seemed tossed, like a mere cockle-shell, to and
fro upon the rough sea. It did not alarm me so much as it distracted my
thoughts, and kept them from dwelling upon possibilities far more
perilous to me than the danger of death by shipwreck. A short suffering
such a death would be.

My escape and flight had been so unexpected, so unhoped for, that it had
bewildered me, and it was almost a pleasure to lie still and listen to
the din and uproar of the sea and the swoop of the wind rushing down
upon it. Was I myself or no? Was this nothing more than a very coherent,
very vivid dream, from which I should awake by-and-by to find myself a
prisoner still, a creature as wretched and friendless as any that the
streets of London contained? My flight had been too extraordinary a
success, so far, for my mind to be able to dwell upon it calmly.

I watched the dawn break through a little port-hole opening upon my
berth, which had been washed and beaten by the water all the night long.
The level light shone across the troubled and leaden-colored surface of
the sea, which seemed to grow a little quieter under its touch. I had
fancied during the night that the waves were running mountains high; but