[Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas by Herman Melville]@TWC D-Link bookOmoo: Adventures in the South Seas CHAPTER XII 8/10
Were anything to happen to him, we would be left without a navigator, for, according to Jermin himself, he had, from the commencement of the voyage, always kept the ship's reckoning, the captain's nautical knowledge being insufficient. But considerations like these, strange as it may seem, seldom or never occurred to the crew.
They were alive only to superstitious fears; and when, in apparent contradiction to the Finn's prophecy, the sick men rallied a little, they began to recover their former spirits, and the recollection of what had occurred insensibly faded from their minds.
In a week's time, the unworthiness of Little Jule as a sea vessel, always a subject of jest, now became more so than ever.
In the forecastle, Flash Jack, with his knife, often dug into the dank, rotten planks ribbed between us and death, and flung away the splinters with some sea joke. As to the remaining invalids, they were hardly ill enough to occasion any serious apprehension, at least for the present, in the breasts of such thoughtless beings as themselves.
And even those who suffered the most, studiously refrained from any expression of pain. The truth is, that among sailors as a class, sickness at sea is so heartily detested, and the sick so little cared for, that the greatest invalid generally strives to mask his sufferings.
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