And there, in that swinging bed, where sleep seemed impossible, and in which he was unpleasantly shaken about, when the ship rolled and pitched through the dark, heaving, discoloured waves, and with dirty men sleeping round him at night, until the atmosphere of the forecastle became like poison, hopelessly and helplessly sick, and half-starved, the boy lay for two days. The crew neglected him shamefully. It was nobody's business to wait on him, and he could procure neither sufficient food nor any water; they only brought him some grog to drink, which in his weakness and sickness was nauseous to him as medicine. "I say, you young cub down there," shouted the skipper to him from the hatchway, "come up and swab this deck." He got up, and after bruising himself severely, as he stumbled about to find the ladder, made an effort to obey the command. But he staggered from feebleness when he reached the deck, and had to grasp for some fresh support at every step. "None of that 'ere slobbering and shamming, Bill. Why, damn you, what d'ye think you're here for, eh? You swab this deck, and in five minutes, or I'll teach you, and be damned." Sick as death, Eric slowly obeyed, but did not get through his task without many blows and curses. He felt very ill; he had no means of washing or cleaning himself; no brush, or comb or soap, or clean linen; and even his sleep seemed unrefreshful when the waking brought no change in his condition. And then the whole life of the ship was odious to him. His sense of refinement was exquisitely keen, and now to be called Bill, and kicked and cuffed about by these gross-minded men, and to hear their rough, coarse, drunken talk, and sometimes endure their still more intolerable patronage, filled him with deeply-seated loathing. His whole soul rebelled and revolted from them all, and, seeing his fastidious pride, not one of them showed him the least glimpse of open kindness, though he observed that one of them did seem to pity him in heart. Things grew worse and worse. The perils which he had to endure at first, when ordered about the rigging, were what affected him least; he longed for death, and often contemplated flinging himself into those cold deep waves which he gazed on daily over the vessel's side. Hope was the only thing which supported him. He had heard from one of the crew that the vessel would be back in not more than six weeks, and he made a deeply-seated resolve to escape the very first day that they again anchored in an English harbour. The homeward voyage was even more intolerable, for the cattle on board greatly increased the amount of necessary menial and disgusting work which fell to his share, as well as made the atmosphere of the close little schooner twice as poisonous as before. And to add to his miseries, his relations with the crew got more and more unfavourable, and began to reach their climax.