The old passenger, who had descended to the gun-deck, looked like one carved in stone as he stood motionless at the foot of the stairs and glanced sternly over the devastation.  It would have been impossible to move a step upon the deck.

Each bound of the liberated carronade seemed to threaten the destruction of the ship.  But a few moments longer, and shipwreck would be inevitable.

They must either overcome this calamity or perish; some decisive action must be taken.  But what?

What a combatant was this carronade!

Here was this mad creature to be arrested, this flash of lightning to be seized, this thunderbolt to be crushed.  Boisberthelot said to Vieuville:—­

“Do you believe in God, chevalier?”

“Yes and no, sometimes I do!” replied La Vieuville.

“In a tempest?”

“Yes, and in moments like these.”

“Truly God alone can save us,” said Boisberthelot.

All were silent, leaving the carronade to its horrible uproar.

The waves beating the ship from without answered the blows of the cannon within, very much like a couple of hammers striking In turn.

Suddenly in the midst of this inaccessible circus, where the escaped cannon was tossing from side to side, a man appeared, grasping an iron bar.  It was the author of the catastrophe, the chief gunner, whose criminal negligence had caused the accident,—­the captain of the gun.  Having brought about the evil, his intention was to repair it.  Holding a handspike in one hand, and in the other a tiller rope with the slip-noose in it, he had jumped through the hatchway to the deck below.

Then began a terrible struggle; a titanic spectacle; a combat between cannon and cannoneer; a contest between mind and matter; a duel between man and the inanimate.  The man stood in one corner in an attitude of expectancy, leaning on the rider and holding in his hands the bar and the rope; calm, livid, and tragic, he stood firmly on his legs, that were like two pillars of steel.

He was waiting for the cannon to approach him.

The gunner knew his piece, and he felt as though it must know him.  They had lived together a long time.  How often had he put his hand in its mouth.  It was his domestic monster.  He began to talk to it as he would to a dog.  “Come,” said he.  Possibly he loved it.

He seemed to wish for its coming, and yet its approach meant sure destruction for him.  How to avoid being crushed was the question.  All looked on in terror.

Not a breath was drawn freely, except perhaps by the old man, who remained on the gun-deck gazing sternly on the two combatants.

He himself was in danger of being crushed by the piece; still he did not move.

Beneath them the blind sea had command of the battle.  When, in the act of accepting this awful hand-to-hand struggle, the gunner approached to challenge the cannon, it happened that the surging sea held the gun motionless for an instant, as though stupefied.  “Come on!” said the man.  It seemed to listen.