Then he fastened the tub to an oar, to improve the
chance of its being observed, and laid the oar so that it would float
off, in case of the frail boat foundering. The other oar he kept at
hand to steer with, as long as the boat should live, and to help him to
float, when she should have disappeared.
This being done, he felt easier in his mind, as a man who has prepared
for the worst should do. He renewed his vigour, which had begun to flag
under constant labour and long solitude, by consuming another of his
loaves, and taking almost the last draught of his cider, and after
that he battled throughout the dreary day against the increase of bad
weather. Towards the afternoon he saw several ships, one of which he
took to be a British frigate; but none of them espied his poor labouring
craft, or at any rate showed signs of doing so. Then a pilot-boat ran by
him, standing probably for Boulogne, and at one time less than a league
away. She appeared to be English, and he was just about to make signal
for aid, when a patch in her foresail almost convinced him that she was
the traitor of the Canche returning. She was probably out of her proper
course in order to avoid the investing fleet, and she would run inside
it when the darkness fell. Better to go to the bottom than invoke such
aid; and he dropped the oar with his neckerchief upon it, and faced the
angry sea again and the lonely despair of impending night.
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