I was in the way of the walk of the forecastle sentry; that is to say, at the extremity of it, and twice he halted at my side to look at the moon, but never spoke. I heard the doctor talking to the prisoners. He addressed them from over the rail of the poop, and no doubt made the most of this solemn occasion of eclipse and the terror of the gathering storm and the mighty scene of loneliness in whose heart the ship slumbered. I was forced to the quarter-deck presently by a ridiculous argument between the boatswain and the cook. The cook declared that it had long ago been proved that the earth was flat; therefore, as that corner of shadow upon the moon was round, it could not be cast by the earth. Mr. Balls, with a loud, hoarse laugh, exclaimed that those who believed the earth to be flat were misled by the shape of their own heads. ‘Not that I’m a-going to argue,’ said he, ‘that that there shadder’s the earth’s. For the matter of that, who’s going to say it’s a shadder at all? The moon has a hatmosphere, I suppose, and why shouldn’t its hatmosphere be shaped as our’n is with mucky thicknesses like to what’s blazing away yonder? Who’s a-going to prove to me that that there shadder, instead of an eclipse, as they calls it, ain’t a storrum?’ I walked aft and sat upon the coamings of the booby-hatch where I was alone. A fresh division of convicts had been brought up, and the doctor stood over my head haranguing them. He spoke of the enormity of the crimes they had committed, and begged them to consider the moon as a likeness of their soul and the shadow overcreeping it as the darkness of sin and death. ‘But presently,’ said he, ‘that shadow will pass, and the brightness of the moon will look forth in splendour, and the sea beneath it will smile and rejoice in her light. Be it even so with you, my brother sinners; pray that the shadow that is upon you may pass away, that the light which is within you may purely shine again.’ CHAPTER XXXI SHE DESCRIBES A STORM But now the storm was approaching, the moon’s light was growing weak and the stars over our mastheads dim and spare. The lightning was incessant; its flashes glanced into the remotest recesses of the north and brought out the horizon there in gleams of sulphur. The hum of the thunder was deep and ceaseless, with many savage cracks and rattling peals. I cannot tell what progress the eclipse had made by this hour; the moon hung distorted in the sky like a dim silver shield with its sides hacked, and the night looked wild with her and the gathering tempest.