Page 106 - for-the-term-of-his-natural-life

CHAPTER X. EIGHT BELLS.

t seven o’clock there had been also a commotion in the
Aprison. The news of the fever had awoke in the convicts
all that love of liberty which had but slumbered during the
monotony of the earlier part of the voyage. Now that death
menaced them, they longed fiercely for the chance of escape
which seemed permitted to freemen. ‘Let us get out!’ they
said, each man speaking to his particular friend. ‘We are
locked up here to die like sheep.’ Gloomy faces and despond-
ing looks met the gaze of each, and sometimes across this
gloom shot a fierce glance that lighted up its blackness, as
a lightning-flash renders luridly luminous the indigo dull-
ness of a thunder-cloud. By and by, in some inexplicable
way, it came to be understood that there was a conspiracy
afloat, that they were to be released from their shambles,
that some amongst them had been plotting for freedom.
The ‘tween decks held its foul breath in wondering anxi-
ety, afraid to breathe its suspicions. The influence of this
predominant idea showed itself by a strange shifting of at-
oms. The mass of villainy, ignorance, and innocence began
to be animated with something like a uniform movement.
Natural affinities came together, and like allied itself to like,
falling noiselessly into harmony, as the pieces of glass and
coloured beads in a kaleidoscope assume mathematical
forms. By seven bells it was found that the prison was di-

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