As the freedom of a successful expedition was unavoidably permitted, loud jokes, and louder merriment, broke on the silent waters from the reckless seamen, while the exhilarating can passed from hand to hand, strange oaths and dreadful denunciations breaking forth at times from some of the excited crew against their enemy. At length the bustle of re-embarking gradually subsided, and many of the crew descended to the hold of the cutter, in quest of room to stretch their limbs, when a clear, manly voice was heard rising above the deep in those strains that a seaman most loves to hear. Air succeeded air, from different voices, until even the spirit of harmony grew dull with fatigue, and verses began to be heard where songs were expected, and fleeting lines succeeded stanzas. The decks were soon covered with prostrate men, seeking their natural rest under the open heavens, and perhaps dreaming, as they yielded heavily to the rolling of the vessel, of scenes of other times in their own hemisphere. The dark glances of Katherine were concealed beneath her falling lids: and even Cecilia, with her head bowed on the shoulder of her cousin, slept sweetly in innocence and peace. Boltrope groped his way into the hold among the seamen, where, kicking one of the most fortunate of the men from his berth, he established himself in his place with all that cool indifference to the other's comfort that had grown with his experience, from the time when he was treated thus cavalierly in his own person to the present moment. In this manner head was dropped after head on the planks, the guns, or on whatever first offered for a pillow, until Griffith and Barnstable, alone, were left pacing the different sides of the quarter-deck in haughty silence.