was a mile off.

'And now,' says Goss, 'I was drunk last night, and frightened
you--playing tricks with cards. Don't be fools; do your duty, and defy
Davy Jones. If not'--And then he flung open his pea-coat, and we saw
four of the brass-mounted pistols in his belt. But, mates, his one eye
was worse than the four muzzles, and we slunk to our work, and obeyed
him. The easterly breeze came fresh, and we were soon bowling away
nor'ard. The captain stood long at the helm, and we gathered for'ard.
'We're lost!' said Bartholomew; 'we're lost men! We're bought and
sold!'

'Bartholomew,' shouts the captain, 'come and take the helm!' He went
aft, mates, like a lamb; and the captain walked for'ards, and looked
at us, one after another; and the one eye cowed us. We were not like
men; and he was our master. When he went below, we grouped together,
and looked out to windward. It was getting black--black; the wind was
coming off in gusts; and the _Lively Nan_ began to dance to the seas
that came rolling in from the eastward. 'The equinoctial!' we says one
to another. In an hour more, mates, all the sky to windward was like a
big sheet of lead; with white clouds, like feathers, driving athwart
it--the clouds, as it were, whiter than the firmament. You know the
meaning, mates, of a sky like that; and accordingly, by nightfall, we
had it; and the _Lively Nan_, under close-reefed main-sail and
storm-jib, was groaning, and plunging, and diving in the seas--the
wind blowing, mates, as if it would have wrenched the mast out of the
keelson. Many a gale have I been in, before and since, but that was
the worst of all. Well, mates, we thought we were doomed, but we did
our work, silent and steady; and we kept the smack under a press of
canvas that none but such a boat could bear, to claw her off the