The man touched his forehead, and slunk away. Presently he returned with the cannon-balls slung in a canvass bag, the usual receptacle of his needles, palms, and thread, and deliberately fastened them round Mr Donovan's legs. He then lashed him up in the hammock, coaxing his arms under the swathing, so that, while I held him in play, he regularly sewed him up into a most substantial strait waistcoat. It would have been laughable enough, if risibility had been pardonable under such melancholy circumstances, to look at the poor fellow as he now stood stiff and upright, like a bolt of canvass on end, swaying about, and balancing himself, as the vessel rolled about on the heave of the sea; but by this time the sail-maker had fastened the rope securely round his waist, one end of which was in the clutch of three strong fellows, with plenty of the slack coiled down and at hand, had it proved necessary to pay out, and give him scope. "Now, Donovan, dear, come into the boat; do, and let us get on board, will ye." "Benjamin Brail--I expected kindlier thing's at your hands, Benjie. How _can_ I go on board of the old Gazelle, seeing it has gone seven bells" (although it was in reality five in the afternoon), "and I'm to be hove overboard at twelve o'clock?" I saw there was nothing else for it, so I whispered little Binnacle to strike eight bells. At the first chime, poor Donovan pricked up his ear; at the second, he began to settle himself on deck; and before the last struck, he was stretched out on a grating with his eyes closed, and really as still and motionless as if he had been actually dead. I jumped on board, muttered a sentence or two, from recollection, of the funeral service, and tipping the wink, we hove him bodily, stoop and roop, overboard, where he sank for a couple of fathoms, when we hauled him up again. When he sank, he was much excited, and flushed and feverish to look at; but when he was now got into the boat, he was still enough, God knows, and very blue and ghastly; his features were sharp and pinched, and he could only utter a low moaning noise when we had stretched him along the bottom of the boat. "Mercy!" said I, "surely my experiment has not killed him?" However, our best plan now was to get back to the frigate as soon as might be, so Lanyard, who had purposely kept in the background, now gave the word to shove off, and in a minute we were all on the Gazelle's quarterdeck; poor Donovan having been hoisted up, lashed into an accommodation chair. He was instantly taken care of, and, in our excellent surgeon's hands, I am glad to say that he recovered, and lived to be an ornament to the service, and a credit to all connected with him for many a long day afterwards.