he last fibres yielding to its
point. Almost at the same instant a cold spray rushed out, sprinkling
my hand upon the haft, and rushing far up my sleeve.

After giving the blade a twist, I drew it out, and then a jet shot
forth, as if forced from a syringe. In another instant my lips covered
the vent, and I drank delicious draughts--not of spirits, not of wine--
but of water, cold and sweet as though it issued from a rock of
limestone!

CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE.

THE VENT-PEG.

Oh! how I drank of that delicious water! I thought I should never be
satisfied; but at length satiety was produced, and I thirsted no more.

The effect was not immediate--the first long draught did not relieve me,
or only for a time. I longed again, and again placed my lips to the
spouting stream; and this I did repeatedly, until the longing returned
not, and the pangs of thirst were forgotten as if I had never felt them!

It is beyond the power of the imagination to form any idea of the agony
of thirst--mere fancy cannot realise it. It must be experienced to be
known, but a proof of its intensity might be given by adducing the
horrible alternatives to which men have resorted when reduced to the
extremity of this torturing pain. And yet, withal, as soon as the
craving is appeased, so soon as a sufficient quantity of water has
passed the lips, the pain exists no more, but ends with the suddenness
of a dream! No other bodily ill can be so quickly healed.

My thirst was now gone, and I felt buoyant; but my habitual prudence did
not forsake me. During the intervals when my lips were removed from the
vent, I had kept the water from running by pressing the end of my
fore-finger into the hole, and using it as a stopper. Something
whispered me that it would be well not to waste the precious fluid, and
I resolved to obey the suggestion. When I had finished drinking, I used
my finger as before; but after a little, I grew tired of making a
vent-peg of my finger, and looked about for something else. I groped
all over the bottom timbers, but could find nothing--not the smallest
piece of stick within reach of my right hand. It was the fore-finger of
my left that was playing vent-peg; and I dared not remove it, else the
water would have gushed forth in a tolerably thick, and therefore a
wasteful, jet.

I bethought me of a piece of cheese, and I drew what remained from my
pocket. It was of too excellent a quality for the purpose, and crumble