Chapter 20 - Page 2

only a skeleton could keep cool (from the free current of air
through its bones), after being drenched in my own perspiration,
I managed to wedge myself out of my hammock; and with what little
strength I had left, lowered myself gently to the deck. Let me
see now, thought I, whether my ingenuity cannot devise some
method whereby I can have room to breathe and sleep at the same
time. I have it. I will lower my hammock underneath all these
others; and then--upon that separate and independent level, at
least--I shall have the whole berth-deck to myself. Accordingly,
I lowered away my pallet to the desired point--about three inches
from the floor--and crawled into it again.

But, alas! this arrangement made such a sweeping semi-circle of
my hammock, that, while my head and feet were at par, the small
of my back was settling down indefinitely; I felt as if some
gigantic archer had hold of me for a bow.

But there was another plan left. I triced up my hammock with all
my strength, so as to bring it wholly _above_ the tiers of
pallets around me. This done, by a last effort, I hoisted myself
into it; but, alas! it was much worse than before. My luckless
hammock was stiff and straight as a board; and there I was--laid
out in it, with my nose against the ceiling, like a dead man's
against the lid of his coffin.

So at last I was fain to return to my old level, and moralise
upon the folly, in all arbitrary governments, of striving to get
either _below_ or _above_ those whom legislation has placed upon
an equality with yourself.

Speaking of hammocks, recalls a circumstance that happened one
night in the Neversink. It was three or four times repeated, with
various but not fatal results.

The watch below was fast asleep on the berth-deck, where perfect
silence was reigning, when a sudden shock and a groan roused up
all hands; and the hem of a pair of white trowsers vanished up
one of the ladders at the fore-hatchway.

We ran toward the groan, and found a man lying on the deck; one end of
his hammock having given way, pitching his head close to three twenty-
four pound cannon shot, which must have been purposely placed in that
position. When it was discovered that this man had long been suspected
of being an _informer_ among the crew, little surprise and less
pleasure were evinced at his narrow escape.