"At high tide to-morrow morning," answered the
pilot.
Usanga did not see him, being too intent upon the unaccustomed duties of a
pilot, but the blacks across the meadow saw him and they ran forward with loud and savage cries and menacing rifles to intercept him.
From out of the fog came the mournful tolling of a bell, and I could see the
pilot turning the wheel with great rapidity.
The
pilot and third officer loomed above him, as did the man at the wheel, a bulky German, deserted from a warship, whom he had signed on in Rangoon.
Electric wires connected the
pilot's cage with the machinery room, and from there the Captain could communicate simultaneously to his Nautilus the direction and the speed.
Providence, I say, began here to clear up our way a little; and the first thing that offered was, that our old Portuguese
pilot brought a Japan merchant to us, who inquired what goods we had: and, in the first place, he bought all our opium, and gave us a very good price for it, paying us in gold by weight, some in small pieces of their own coin, and some in small wedges, of about ten or twelves ounces each.
When the young man on board saw this person approach, he left his station by the
pilot, and, hat in hand, leaned over the ship's bulwarks.
Rebecca did not seem to think this the expression of an exaggerated state of feeling, inasmuch as she replied, "I know; that's just the way it seemed to me at first, and even now, whenever I'm alone and take out the
Pilot back numbers to read over my contributions, I almost burst with pleasure; and it's not that they are good either, for they look worse to me every time I read them."
And now how gladly would I come down from this mast-head and sit on the hatches there where you sit, and listen as you listen, while some one of you reads me that other and more awful lesson which Jonah teaches to me as a
pilot of the living God.
For forty days wind and weather were all in our favour, but the next night a terrific storm arose, which blew us hither and thither for ten days, till the
pilot confessed that he had quite lost his bearings.
A violent storm arose, and with the vessel in great danger of sinking, the one in the stern inquired of the
pilot which of the two ends of the ship would go down first.
We cast anchor within a league of the town, and made a signal for a
pilot. Two of them came on board in less than half an hour, by whom we were guided between certain shoals and rocks, which are very dangerous in the passage, to a large basin, where a fleet may ride in safety within a cable's length of the town-wall.