He had not refused to quit his feet, but kneeling on
one knee, he pressed the tiller down, lashed it, and clinging to the
massive timber, faced the tempest with the steadiness of a water-god.
There was sublimity in the intelligence, deliberation, and calculating
skill, with which this solitary, unknown, and nearly hopeless, mariner
obeyed his professional instinct, in that fearful concussion of the
elements, which, loosened from every restraint, now appeared abandoned to
their own wild and fierce will. He threw aside his cap, pushed forward his
thick but streaming locks, as veils to protect his eyes, and watched the
first encounter of the wind, as the wary but sullen lion keeps his gaze on
the hostile elephant. A grim smile stole across his features, when he felt
the vessel settle again into its watery bed, after that breathless moment
in which there had been reason to fear it might actually be lifted from
its proper element. Then the precaution, which had seemed so useless and
incomprehensible to others, came in play. The bark made a fearful whirl
from the spot where it had so long lain, yielding to the touch of the gust
like a vane turning on its pivot, while the water gurgled several streaks
on deck.
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