The disappointment that came over me, as I ascertained this fact, was scarcely less painful than the anguish I had felt when I first saw my mate carried off into the ocean There would have been a melancholy satisfaction in finding his body, that we might have gone to the bottom together, at least, and thus have slept in a common grave, in the depths of that ocean over which we had sailed so many thousands of leagues in company.  I went and threw myself on the deck, regardless of my own fate, and wept in very bitterness of heart.  I had arranged a mattress on the quarter-deck, and it was on that I now threw myself.  Fatigue overcame me, in the end, and I fell into a deep sleep.  As my recollection left me, my last thought was that I should go down with the ship, as I lay there.  So complete was the triumph of nature, that I did not even dream.  I do not remember ever to have enjoyed more profound and refreshing slumbers; slumbers that continued until returning light awoke me.  To that night’s rest I am probably indebted, under God, for having the means of relating these adventures.

It is scarcely necessary to say that the night had been tranquil; otherwise, a seaman’s ears would have given him the alarm.  When I arose, I found the ocean glittering like a mirror, with no other motion than that which has so often been likened to the slumbering respiration of some huge animal.  The wreck was thumping against the ship’s bottom, announcing its presence, before I left the mattress.  Of wind there was literally not a breath.  Once in a while, the ship would seem to come up to breathe, as a heavy groundswell rolled along her sides, and the wash of the element told the circumstance of such a visit; else, all was as still as the ocean in its infancy.  I knelt, again, and prayed to that dread Being, with whom, it now appeared to me, I stood alone, in the centre of the universe.

Down to the moment when I arose from my knees, the thought of making an effort to save myself, or to try to prolong existence a few hours, by means of the wreck, did not occur to me.  But, when I came to look about me, to note the tranquil condition of the ocean, and to heed the chances, small as they were, that offered, the love of life was renewed within me, and I seriously set about the measures necessary to such an end.

The first step was to sound the pumps, anew.  The water had not gained in the night as rapidly as it had gained throughout the preceding day.  But it had gained; there being three feet more of it than when I last sounded—­the infallible evidence of the existence of a leak that no means of mine could stop.  It was, then, hopeless to think of saving the ship.  She had settled in the water, already, so as to bring the lower bolts of both fore and main channels awash; and I supposed she might float for four-and-twenty hours longer, unless an injury that I had discovered under the larboard cat-head, and which had been received from the wreck, should sooner get under water.  It appeared to me that a butt had been started there:  such a leak would certainly hasten the fate of the vessel by some hours, should it come fairly into the account.