John Gaythers Garden and the Stories Told Therein | Page 9

They were all empty, every blessed one of them.
"Now I was certain that this vessel had been outward bound; she had
been taking out empty hogsheads, and had expected to carry them back
full of West Indian rum, which was a mighty profitable article of
commerce in those days. But she had fallen into temptation, and had
gone to the bottom; and here were her hogsheads just as tight and just
as empty as on the day she set sail from England.
"As I stood looking at the great wall of empty hogsheads in front of me,
wondering if it would not be better to give up searching any more on
this vessel, which evidently had not been laden with anything valuable,
and go again on board the Spanish ship and make some sort of a plan
for fastening lines to those treasure-boxes so that they might be hauled
up on board the brig, I began to feel a sort of trouble with my breath, as
if I might suffocate if I did not get out soon. I knew, of course, that
something was the matter with my air-supply, and I signalled for them
to pump lively. But it was of no use; my supply of fresh air seemed to
be cut off. I began to gasp. I was terribly frightened, you may be sure;
for, with air gone and no answer to my signals, I must perish. I jerked
savagely at my signal-cord to let them know that I wanted to be pulled
up,--it was possible that I might reach the surface before being
suffocated,--but the cord offered no resistance; I pulled it toward me as
I jerked. It had been cut or broken.
"Then I took hold of my air-tube and pulled it. It, too, was unattached
at the other end; it had no connection with the air-pump.
"Breathing with great difficulty, and with my legs trembling under me,
a thought flashed through my mind. As rapidly as possible I drew in the
india-rubber air-tube. Presently I had the loose end of it in my hand.
Then I caught hold of the bung of the hogshead which I had opened and
which was just in front of me, and the instant I pulled it out I thrust in

the end of the air-tube. To my great delight, it fitted tightly in the
bung-hole. And now in an instant I felt as if I was sitting upon the
pinnacles of Paradise. Air, fresh air, came to me through the tube! Not
in abundance, not freely, for there was some water in the tube and there
was a good deal of gurgling. But it was air, fresh air; and every time an
exhaled breath escaped through the valve in my helmet, a little air from
the hogshead came in to take its place.
"I stood for a while, weak with happiness. I did not know what had
happened; I did not care. I could breathe; that was everything in the
world to me.
"By gradually raising the tube a few feet at a time I managed to empty
the water it contained into the hogshead, and then I breathed more
easily. As I did not wish to wait until the air in the hogshead had been
exhausted, I went to work on the bung in the next one, and soon
transferred the end of my tube to that, which would probably last me a
good while, for it was almost entirely free from water.
"Now I began to cogitate and wonder. I pulled in the end of the
signal-cord, and I found it had not been rubbed and torn by barnacles;
the end of it had been clean cut with a knife. I remembered that this
was the case with the air-tube; as I placed it into the bung-hole of the
first hogshead I had noticed how smoothly it had been severed.
"Now I felt a tug at the rope by which I was raised and lowered. I didn't
like this. If I should be pulled up I might be jerked away from my
air-supply and suffocate before I got to the surface. So I took a turn of
the rope around a stick of timber near by, and they might pull as much
as they chose without disturbing me. There I stood, and thought, and
wondered. But, above everything, I could not help feeling all the time
how good that air was! It seemed to go through every part of me. It was
better than wine; it was better than anything I had ever breathed or
tasted. A little while ago I was on the point of perishing. Now before
me there were tiers of hogsheads full of air! If it had not been that I
would be obliged