Chapter 8

They Push Off, Velis Et Remis

And now to tell how, tempted by devil or good angel, and a thousand
miles from land, we embarked upon this western voyage.

It was midnight, mark you, when our watch began; and my turn at the
helm now coming on was of course to be avoided. On some plausible
pretense, I induced our solitary watchmate to assume it; thus leaving
myself untrammeled, and at the same time satisfactorily disposing of
him. For being a rather fat fellow, an enormous consumer of "duff,"
and with good reason supposed to be the son of a farmer, I made no
doubt, he would pursue his old course and fall to nodding over the
wheel. As for the leader of the watch--our harpooner--he fell heir to
the nest of old jackets, under the lee of the mizzen-mast, left nice
and warm by his predecessor.

The night was even blacker than we had anticipated; there was no
trace of a moon; and the dark purple haze, sometimes encountered at
night near the Line, half shrouded the stars from view.

Waiting about twenty minutes after the last man of the previous watch
had gone below, I motioned to Jarl, and we slipped our shoes from our
feet. He then descended into the forecastle, and I sauntered aft
toward the quarter-deck. All was still. Thrice did I pass my hand
full before the face of the slumbering lubber at the helm, and right
between him and the light of the binnacle.

Mark, the harpooneer, was not so easily sounded. I feared to
approach him. He lay quietly, though; but asleep or awake, no more
delay. Risks must be run, when time presses. And our ears were a
pointer's to catch a sound.

To work we went, without hurry, but swiftly and silently. Our various
stores were dragged from their lurking-places, and placed in the
boat, which hung from the ship's lee side, the side depressed in the
water, an indispensable requisite to an attempt at escape. And though
at sundown the boat was to windward, yet, as we had foreseen, the
vessel having been tacked during the first watch, brought it to leeward.

Endeavoring to manhandle our clumsy breaker, and lift it into the
boat, we found, that by reason of the intervention of the shrouds, it
could not be done without, risking a jar; besides straining the craft
in lowering. An expedient, however, though at the eleventh hour, was
hit upon. Fastening a long rope to the breaker, which was perfectly
tight, we cautiously dropped it overboard; paying out enough line, to
insure its towing astern of the ship, so as not to strike against the
copper. The other end of the line we then secured to the boat's stern.

Fortunately, this was the last thing to be done; for the breaker,
acting as a clog to the vessel's way in the water, so affected her
steering