Our new captain caught that gaze, and I was, for a
single moment, in hope he would relent, and let the wretch go. But
Marble had persuaded himself he was performing a great act of nautical
justice; nor was he aware, himself, how much he was influenced by a
feeling allied to vengeance.
"Sway away!" he called out; and Smudge was dangling at the yard-arm in
a few seconds.
A block of wood could not have been more motionless than the body of
this savage, after one quivering shudder of suffering had escaped
it. There it hung, like a jewel-block, and every sign of life was soon
taken away. In a quarter of an hour, a man was sent up, and, cutting
the rope, the body fell, with a sharp plunge, into the water, and
disappeared.
At a later day, the account of this affair found its way into the
newspapers at home. A few moralists endeavoured to throw some doubts
over the legality and necessity of the proceedings, pretending that
more evil than good was done to the cause of sacred justice by such
disregard of law and principles; but the feeling of trade, and the
security of ships when far from home, were motives too powerful to be
put down by the still, quiet remonstrances of reason and right. The
abuses to which such practices would be likely to lead, in cases in
which one of the parties constituted himself the law, the judge, and
the executioner, were urged in vain against the active and
ever-stimulating incentive of a love of gold.
Pages:
344
345
346
347
348
349
350
351
352
353
354
355
356
357
358
359
360
361
362
363
364
365
366
367
368