the quantity of water we had pumped out I therefore knew that the leak or rather leaks must be very bad ones. Still, if I had had my fifty men with me, I should have been able, I was sure, unless the weather came on very bad, to keep the leaks under. However, I resolved to keep up my own spirits and those of the people with me as well as I could. Now and then I shouted out a few words of encouragement, then I sang a few snatches of some well-known song, or cut a joke or two suited to the taste of my followers. This kept them in good spirits and prevented them from thinking of the dangerous predicament in which we were placed. Hour after hour dragged its heavy footsteps along, and often I felt so weary that I thought I must throw myself down on the deck and give in. Then I would take a few minutes' rest, sitting on a gun, and go at it again. Everything contributed to make me persevere, and not the least, I must own, was my anger and disgust at the shameful and cowardly way in which the ship had been abandoned. Oh, how I wished for daylight! and yet daylight I knew was far-off. I kept Grampus and Rockets near me that I might send them, as might be necessary, to ascertain the state of affairs in different parts of the ship. In a small craft I might more easily have known what was going forward, but in a huge lumbering ship like the Leviathan I could not tell what might be occurring. When the condition of a ship has become desperate, sailors have very often broken into the spirit-room, and, getting drunk, have allowed her to sink with them. I had my fears that my poor fellows, when they became weary, would be guilty of some similar excess. "Well, Grampus, how is the ship getting on?" I asked, after he had returned from one of the trips on which I had despatched him. "The old craft is sucking in almost as much water as our fine fellows drive out of her, sir, but for all that there isn't one of them shirking his duty," he answered, in a cheerful voice. "If we could have a glass of grog apiece served out among us, I don't think as how it would do us any harm." "I'll see to it," I replied. "Here, give me a spell; I'll get some myself from the spirit-room." Searching about I found a can, and lantern in hand I descended to the lower regions of the ship. As I groped my way there, the strange noises which assailed my ears--the creakings, the groans, the wash of the water--almost deafened me. I felt strongly inclined to turn back, for I could not help fancying that the ship was that instant about to go down. The air, too, was close and pestiferous, as if all the foul vapours had been forced up from the inward recesses of the hold. She continued pitching and rolling in a way so unusual that I could scarcely keep my legs. This was owing to the unseamanlike mode in which the cargo had been stowed: indeed, a ship of war was not calculated to carry a cargo at all, in addition to her own stores, water and ammunition.