Why I did so I can hardly tell. An
indefinite sense of awe, which at first sight of the navigators of the
ship had taken hold of my mind, was perhaps the principle of my
concealment. I was unwilling to trust myself with a race of people who
had offered, to the cursory glance I had taken, so many points of
vague novelty, doubt, and apprehension. I therefore thought proper
to contrive a hiding-place in the hold. This I did by removing a small
portion of the shifting-boards, in such a manner as to afford me a
convenient retreat between the huge timbers of the ship.
I had scarcely completed my work, when a footstep in the hold forced
me to make use of it. A man passed by my place of concealment with a
feeble and unsteady gait. I could not see his face, but had an
opportunity of observing his general appearance. There was about it an
evidence of great age and infirmity. His knees tottered beneath a load
of years, and his entire frame quivered under the burthen. He muttered
to himself, in a low broken tone, some words of a language which I
could not understand, and groped in a corner among a pile of
singular-looking instruments, and decayed charts of navigation.
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