Chapter 20 - Page 2

hailstones.

Now, while we were employed bracing round the yards, whispering Jarl
must needs pester me again with his confounded suspicions of goblins
on board. He swore by the main-mast, that when the fore-yard swung
round, he had heard a half-stifled groan from that quarter; as if one
of his bugbears had been getting its aerial legs jammed. I laughed:--
hinting that goblins were incorporeal. Whereupon he besought me to
ascend the fore-rigging and test the matter for myself But here my
mature judgment got the better of my first crude opinion. I civilly
declined. For assuredly, there was still a possibility, that the
fore-top might be tenanted, and that too by living miscreants; and a
pretty hap would be mine, if, with hands full of rigging, and legs
dangling in air, while surmounting the oblique futtock-
shrouds, some unseen arm should all at once tumble me overboard.
Therefore I held my peace; while Jarl went on to declare, that with
regard to the character of the brigantine, his mind was now pretty
fully made up;--she was an arrant impostor, a shade of a ship, full
of sailors' ghosts, and before we knew where we were, would dissolve
in a supernatural squall, and leave us twain in the water. In short,
Jarl, the descendant of the superstitious old Norsemen, was full of
old Norse conceits, and all manner of Valhalla marvels concerning the
land of goblins and goblets. No wonder then, that with this catastrophe
in prospect, he again entreated me to quit the ill-starred craft,
carrying off nothing from her ghostly hull. But I refused.

One can not relate every thing at once. While in the cabin, we came
across a "barge" of biscuit, and finding its contents of a quality
much superior to our own, we had filled our pockets and occasionally
regaled ourselves in the intervals of rummaging. Now this sea cake-
basket we had brought on deck. And for the first time since bidding
adieu to the Arcturion having fully quenched our thirst, our appetite
returned with a rush; and having nothing better to do till day
dawned, we planted the bread-barge in the middle of the quarter-deck;
and crossing our legs before it, laid close seige thereto, like the
Grand Turk and his Vizier Mustapha sitting down before Vienna.

Our castle, the Bread-Barge was of the common sort; an oblong oaken
box, much battered and bruised, and like the Elgin Marbles, all over
inscriptions and carving:--foul anchors, skewered hearts, almanacs,
Burton-blocks, love verses, links of cable, Kings of Clubs; and
divers mystic diagrams in chalk, drawn by old Finnish mariners; in
casting horoscopes and prophecies. Your old tars are all Daniels.
There was a round hole in one side, through which, in getting at the
bread, invited guests thrust their