"I meant business, but they meant noise only.

Nothing happened." 'And the rising sun found him just as he had jumped up first in the bows of the boat.

What a persistence of readiness! He had been holding the tiller in his hand, too, all the night.

They had dropped the rudder overboard while attempting to ship it, and I suppose the tiller got kicked forward somehow while they were rushing up and down that boat trying to do all sorts of things at once so as to get clear of the side.

It was a long heavy piece of hard wood, and apparently he had been clutching it for six hours or so.