inking it was now time to take another survey of the scene I went on
deck.

On looking over the larboard bulwark rail, the first thing I saw was a
ship about two miles off. She was on the larboard tack, under courses,
topsails, and main-topgallant sail, heading as if to cross my bows. The
sunshine made her canvas look as white as snow against the skirts of the
body of vapour that had trailed a little to leeward of her, and her
black hull flashed as though she discharged a broadside every time she
rose wet to the northern glory out of the hollow of the swell with a
curl of silver at her cutwater.

My heart came into my throat; I seemed not to breathe; not to have saved
my life could I have uttered a cry, so amazed and transported was I by
this unexpected apparition. I stared like one in a dream, and my head
felt as if all the blood in my body had surged into it. But then, all on
a sudden, there happened a revulsion of feeling. Suppose she should
prove a privateer--a French war-vessel--of a nation hostile to my own?
Thought so wrought in me that I trembled like an idiot in a fright. The
telescope was too weak to resolve her, I could do better with my eyes;
and I stood at the bulwarks gazing and gazing as if she were the spectre
ship of the Scandinavian legend.

There were flags below and I could have hoisted a signal of distress:
but to what purpose? If the appearance of the schooner did not
sufficiently illustrate her condition, there was certainly no virtue in
the language and declarations of bunting to exceed her own mute
assurance. I watched her with a passion of anxiety, never doubting her
intention to speak to me, at all events to draw close and look at me,
wholly concerning myself with her character. The swell made us both
dance, and the blue brows of the rollers would often hide her to the
height of her rails; but we were closing each other middling fast she
travelling at seven and I at four miles in the hour, and presently I
could see that she carried a number of boats.

A whaler, thought I; and after a little I was sure of it by perceiving
the rings over her top-gallant rigging for the look-out to stand in.

On being convinced of this, I ran below for a shawl that was in my
cabin, and, jumping on to the bulwarks, stood flourishing it for some
minutes to let them know that there was a man aboard. She luffed to
deaden her way, that I might swim close, and as we approached each other
I observed a crowd of head