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- not send off a boat to the wreck; but the steerage passengers were
indignant at what they called his barbarity. For me, I could not but
feel amazed and shocked at his indifference; but my subsequent sea
experiences have shown me, that such conduct as this is very common,
though not, of course, when human life can be saved.
So away we sailed, and left her; drifting, drifting on; a garden spot
for barnacles, and a playhouse for the sharks.
“Look there,” said Jackson, hanging over the rail and coughing—“look
there; that’s a sailor’s coffin. Ha! ha! Buttons,” turning round to
me—“how do you like that, Buttons? Wouldn’t you like to take a sail
with them ’ere dead men? Wouldn’t it be nice?” And then he tried to
laugh, but only coughed again. “Don’t laugh at dem poor fellows,” said
Max, looking grave; “do’ you see dar bodies, dar souls are farder off
dan de Cape of Dood Hope.”
“Dood Hope, Dood Hope,” shrieked Jackson, with a horrid grin, mimicking
the Dutchman, “dare is no dood hope for dem, old boy; dey are drowned
and d .... d, as you and I will be, Red Max, one of dese dark nights.”
“No, no,” said Blunt, “all sailors are saved; they have plenty of
squalls here below, but fair weather aloft.”
“And did you get that out of your silly Dream Book, you Greek?” howled
Jackson through a cough. “Don’t talk of heaven to me—it’s a lie—I know
it—and they are all fools that believe in it. Do you think, you Greek,
that there’s any heaven for _you?_ Will they let _you_ in there, with
that tarry hand, and that oily head of hair? Avast! when some shark
gulps you down his hatchway one of these days, you’ll find, that by
dying, you’ll only go from one gale of wind to another; mind that, you
Irish cockney! Yes, you’ll be bolted down like one of your own pills:
and I should like to see the whole ship swallowed down in the Norway
maelstrom, like a box on ’em. That would be a dose of salts for ye!”
And so saying, he went off, holding his hands to his chest, and
coughing, as if his last hour was come.
Every day this Jackson seemed to grow worse and worse, both in body and
mind. He seldom spoke, but to contradict, deride, or curse; and all the
time, though his face grew thinner and thinner, his eyes seemed to
kindle more and more, as if he were going to die out at last, and leave
them burning like tapers before a corpse.
Though he had never attended churches, and knew nothing about
Christianity; no more than a Malay pirate; and though he could not read
a word, yet he was spontaneously an atheist and an infidel; and during
the long night watches, would enter into arguments, to prove that there
was nothing to be believed; nothing to be loved, and nothing worth
living for; but every thing to be hated, in the wide world. He was a
horrid desperado; and like a wild Indian, whom he resembled in his
tawny skin and high cheek bones, he seemed to run amuck at heaven and
earth. He was a Cain afloat; branded on his yellow brow with some
inscrutable curse; and going about corrupting and searing every heart
that beat near him.
But there seemed even more woe than wickedness about the man; and his
wickedness seemed to spring from his woe; and for all his hideousness,
there was that in his eye at times, that was ineffably pitiable and
touching; and though there were moments when I almost hated this
Jackson, yet I have pitied no man as I have pitied him.
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