Читать книгу Men Against the Sea – Book Set. The Greatest Maritime Adventure Novels: The Bounty Trilogy, Lost Island, The Hurricane, Botany Bay, The Far Lands, Tales of the South Seas… онлайн

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“I have noticed it, sir.”

“I suggest that, as you read, you keep these particular men in mind. If you do this the manner of your reading will take care of itself. It is unnecessary to remind you that you are fighting for your life. This is certain to make your words sufficiently impressive.”

By this time the advisors to the other prisoners had completed their work, and they left the Hector with Mr. Graham. No day, in all the interminable months we had passed as prisoners, had slipped by so quickly as this one.

On Monday morning, September 17, the solitary gun boomed from the Duke, the signal for assembling the court-martial. We were conveyed on board with the usual guard of marines, and arrived a good half-hour before the opening of the Court. Although I had told Mr. Graham that he need have no fears about my coolness, I felt anything but self-possessed as the minutes slowly passed. As we were marched across the quarter-deck, I caught a glimpse of Sir Joseph and Dr. Hamilton among the crowd of officers and civilians waiting there. I dreaded that daily ordeal of mounting the gangway of the Duke, and the march, two by two, along the deck to the great cabin. We were objects of curiosity to everyone, and many of the officers stared at us as though we were wild animals. At least, so it seemed to me, but no doubt I was unusually sensitive at that time, and imagined insolence and hostility on faces which revealed nothing more than natural curiosity.