E.
"I came on deck to the relief at four o'clock one morning: the weather
was quiet, a pleasant breeze blowing off the starboard beam; our ship
was barque-rigged, with short, topgallant masts--Cape Horn fashion;
she was thrusting through it leisurely under topsails and a
maintopgallantsail, and the whole Pacific heave so cradled her as she
went that she seemed to sleep as she sailed.
"Day broke soon after five, and as the light brightened out I caught
sight of a gleam on the edge of the sea. It was as white with the
risen sun upon it as an iceberg. I levelled the glass and made out the
topmast canvas of a small vessel. There was nothing to excite one in
the spectacle of a distant sail. The barque's work went on; the decks
were washed down, the look-out aloft hailed and nothing reported, and
at seven bells the crew went to breakfast, at which hour we had risen
the distant sail with a rapidity that somewhat puzzled the captain and
me. For, first of all, she was not so far off now but that we could
distinguish the lay of her head. She looked to be going our way, but
clearly she was stationary, for the _Swan_, which was the name of our
barque, though as seaworthy an old tub as ever went to leeward on a
bowline, was absolutely without legs: nothing more sluggish was ever
afloat; for _her_ then to have overhauled anything that was actually
under way would have been marvellous.
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