rt so as to cause him a good deal of agony. Indeed, all
along I had been surprised that he should have found his sight so
easily after having sat in blindness for forty-eight years, and it was
not wonderful that the amazing brilliance on deck, smiting his sight on
a sudden, should have caused him to cry out as if he had lost the use of
his eyes for ever.

I waited patiently, and in about ten minutes he was able to look about
him, and then it was not long before he could see without pain. He stood
a minute gazing at the glories upon the rigging, and in that piercing
light I noticed the unwholesome colour of his face. His cap hid the
scar, and nothing of his countenance was to be seen but the cheeks,
eyes, and nose; he was much more wrinkled than I had supposed, and
methought the spirit of cruelty lay visible in every line. I had never
seen eyes so full of cunning and treachery--so expressive, I should say,
of these qualities; yet they were no bigger than mere punctures. I was
sensible of a momentary fear of the man--not, let me say, an emotion of
cowardice--but a sort of mixture of alarm and awe, such as a ghost might
inspire. This I put down to the searching light in which I watched him
for a moment or two, an irradiation subtle enough to give the sharpest
form to expression, to exquisitely define every meaning that was
distinguishable in his graveyard physiognomy. I left him to stare and
judge for himself of the posture in which the long hard gale had put the
schooner and stepped over to the two bodies. They were shrouded in ice
from head to foot, as though they had each man been packed in a glass
case cunningly wrought to their shapes. Their faces were hid by the
crystal masks. Tassard joined me.

"Small chance for your friends now," said I, "even if you were agreeable
to my proposal to attempt to revive them."

"So!" cried he, touching the body of the mate with his foot; "and this
is the end of the irresistible Trentanove! for what conquests has Death
robed him so bravely? See, the colours shine in him like fifty different
kinds of ribbands. Poor fellow! he could not curl his moustachios now,
though the loveliest eyes in Europe were fixed in passionate admiration
on him. He'll never slit another throat, nor hiccup Petrarch over a
goblet nor remonstrate with me on my humanity. Shall we toss the bodies
over the side?"

"They are your friends," said I; "do as you please."

"But we must empty their pockets first. Bu