The day dawned on a scene entirely different from that which had marked the tempestuous deformity of the night.  The whole fury of the winds appear ed to have been expended in their precocious effort.  From the moderate gale, to which they had fallen by the end of the middle watch, they further altered to a vacillating breeze; and, ere the sun had risen, the changeful air had subsided into a flat calm.  The sea went down as suddenly as the power which had raised, it vanished; and, by the time the broad golden light of the sun was shed fairly and fully upon the unstable element, it lay unruffled and polished, though still gently heaving in swells so long and heavy as to resemble the placid respiration of a sleeping infant.

The hour was still early, and the serene appearance of the sky and the ocean gave every promise of a day which might be passed in devising the expedients necessary to bring the ship again, in some measure, under the command of her people.

“Sound the pumps,” said Wilder, observing that the crew were appearing from the different places in which they had bestowed their cares and their persons together, during the later hours of the night.

“Do you hear me, sir?” he added sternly, observing that no one moved to obey his order.  “Let the pumps be sounded, and the ship cleared of every inch of water.”

Nighthead, to whom Wilder had now addressed himself, regarded his Commander with an oblique ind sullen eye, and then exchanged singularly intelligent glances with his comrades, before he saw fit to make the smallest motion towards compliance.  But there was that, in the authoritative mien of his superior, which finally induced him to comply.  The dilatory manner in which the seamen performed the duty was quickened, however, as the rod ascended, and the well-known signs of a formidable leak met their eyes.  The experiment was repeated with greater activity, and with far more precision.

“If witchcraft can clear the hold of a ship that is already half full of water,” said Nighthead, casting another sullen glance towards the attentive Wilder “the sooner it is done the better; for the whole cunning of something more than a bungler in the same will be needed, in order to make the pumps of the ‘Royal Caroline’ suck!”

“Does the ship leak?” demanded his superior with a quickness of utterance which sufficiently proclaimed how important he deemed the intelligence.

“Yesterday, I would have boldly put my name to the articles of any craft that floats the ocean; and had the Captain asked me if I understood her nature and character, as certain as that my name is Francis Nighthead, I should have told him, yes.  But I find that the oldest seaman may still learn something of the water; though it should be got in crossing a ferry in a flat.”

“What mean you, sir?” demanded Wilder, who, for the first time, began to note the mutinous looks assumed by his mate, no less than the threatening manner in which he was seconded by the crew.  “Have the pumps rigged without delay, and clear the ship of the water.”