The place had the empty and musty feel and smell usual to a dwelling no longer inhabited.
Everywhere was a thick litter of discarded and ragged garments, old sea-boots, leaky oilskins--all the worthless forecastle dunnage of a long voyage.
Abandoned hastily, was my conclusion, as I ascended to the deck.

Hope was alive again in my breast, and I looked about me with greater coolness.

I noted that the boats were missing.

The steerage told the same tale as the forecastle.

The hunters had packed their belongings with similar haste.