Chapter 24

"Had I been any god of power, I would
Have sunk the sea within the earth, ere
It should the good ship so have swallowed."
_Tempest_.

The arms of Dillon were released from their confinement by the
cockswain, as a measure of humane caution against accidents, when they
entered the surf; and the captive now availed himself of the
circumstance to bury his features in the folds of his attire, when he
brooded over the events of the last few hours with that mixture of
malignant passion and pusillanimous dread of the future, that formed the
chief ingredients in his character. From this state of apparent quietude
neither Barnstable nor Tom seemed disposed to rouse him by their
remarks, for both were too much engaged with their own gloomy
forebodings, to indulge in any unnecessary words. An occasional
ejaculation from the former, as if to propitiate the spirit of the
storm, as he gazed on the troubled appearance of the elements, or a
cheering cry from the latter to animate his crew, alone were heard amid
the sullen roaring of the waters, and the mournful whistling of the
winds that swept heavily across the broad waste of the German Ocean.
There might have been an hour consumed thus, in a vigorous struggle
between the seamen and the growing billows, when the boat doubled the
northern headland of the desired haven, and shot, at once, from its
boisterous passage along the margin of the breakers into the placid
waters of the sequestered bay, The passing blasts were still heard
rushing above the high lands that surrounded, and, in fact, formed, the
estuary; but the profound stillness of deep night pervaded the secret
recesses, along the unruffled surface of its waters. The shadows of the
hills seemed to have accumulated, like a mass of gloom, in the centre of
the basin, and though every eye involuntarily turned to search, it was
in vain that the anxious seamen endeavored to discover their little
vessel through its density. While the boat glided into this quiet scene,
Barnstable anxiously observed:

"Everything is as still as death."

"God send it is not the stillness of death!" ejaculated the cockswain.
"Here, here," he continued, speaking in a lower tone, as if fearful of
being overheard, "here she lies, sir, more to port; look into the streak
of clear sky above the marsh, on the starboard hand of the wood, there;
that long black line is her maintopmast; I know it by the rake; and
there is her night-pennant fluttering about that bright star; ay, ay,
sir, there go our own stars aloft yet, dancing among the stars in the
heavens! God bless her! God bless her! she rides as easy and as quiet as
a gull asleep!"

"I believe all in her sleep