And yet, upon the other hand,
I have known none so nervous, so oppressed with
possibilities, looking upon the world at large, and the
life of a sailor in particular, with so constant and
haggard a consideration of the ugly chances. All his
courage was in blood, not merely cold, but icy with
reasoned apprehension. He would lay our little craft
rail under, and "hang on" in a squall, until I gave
myself up for lost, and the men were rushing to their
stations of their own accord. "There," he would say,
"I guess there's not a man on board would have hung on
as long as I did that time: they'll have to give up
thinking me no schooner sailor. I guess I can shave
just as near capsizing as any other captain of this
vessel, drunk or sober." And then he would fall to
repining and wishing himself well out of the
enterprise, and dilate on the peril of the seas, the
particular dangers of the schooner rig, which he
abhorred, the various ways in which we might go to the
bottom, and the prodigious fleet of ships that have
sailed out in the course of history, dwindled from the
eyes of watchers, and returned no more.
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