Never before had I the faintest conception of the breadth and depth and height of a naval officer's objurgatory powers.

For ten minutes he went on in several languages without stopping, and he scarcely ever repeated himself.
Meanwhile the dark ring crept on, while all that great assembly fixed their eyes upon the sky and stared and stared in fascinated silence.
Strange and unholy shadows encroached upon the moonlight, an ominous quiet filled the place.

Everything grew still as death.

Slowly and in the midst of this most solemn silence the minutes sped away, and while they sped the full moon passed deeper and deeper into the shadow of the earth, as the inky segment of its circle slid in awful majesty across the lunar craters.

The great pale orb seemed to draw near and to grow in size.