By the time I got as far aft as the
main-mast, the vessel was our own. Nearly half the Indians had thrown
themselves into the sea; the remaining dozen had either been knocked
in the head like beeves, or were stuck, like so many porkers. The dead
bodies followed the living into the sea. Old Smudge alone remained, at
the moment of which I have spoken.
The leader of the savages was examining the movements of Neb, at the
moment the shout was raised; and the black, abandoning the wheel,
threw his arms round those of the old man, holding him like a vice. In
this situation he was found by Marble and myself, who approached at
the same instant, one on each side of the quarter-deck.
"Overboard with the blackguard!" called out the excited mate;
"overboard with him, Neb, like a trooper's horse!"
"Hold--" I interrupted, "spare the old wretch, Mr. Marble;--he spared
me."
A request from me would, at any moment, outweigh an order from the
captain, himself, so far as the black was concerned, else Smudge would
certainly have gone into the ocean, like a bundle of straw. Marble had
in him a good deal of the indifference to bodily suffering that is
generated by habit, and, aroused, he was a dangerous, and sometimes a
hard man; but, in the main, he was not cruel; and then he was always
manly.
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