Don't be alarmed when you hear the hammer above. I shall do
it, and I shall have short nails in my hand as well as long, and
use the short ones only. Wait till you hear the boat with all of
us shove off, and then pry up the cabin hatch with your back. The
vessel will float a quarter of an hour after the holes are bored
in her. Slip into the sea on the port side, and keep the vessel
between you and the boat. You will find plenty of loose lumber,
wrenched away on purpose, drifting about to hold on by. It's
a fine night and a smooth sea, and there's a chance that a ship
may pick you up while there's life left in you. I can do no
more.--Yours truly, J. M.'
"As I came to those last words, I heard the hammering down of
the hatch over my head. I don't suppose I'm more of a coward than
most people, but there was a moment when the sweat poured down me
like rain. I got to be my own man again before the hammering was
done, and found myself thinking of somebody very dear to me in
England. I said to myself: 'I'll have a try for my life, for her
sake, though the chances are dead against me.'
"I put a letter from that person I have mentioned into one of
the stoppered bottles of my dressing-case, along with the mate's
warning, in case I lived to see him again.
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