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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Never, I think, during the whole of our voyage, were our spirits so low as upon this same afternoon. The sea stretched away, gray and solitary, and we dared not think of the horizons beyond horizons that remained to be crossed before we could set foot upon any shore. Most of us knew that we were still far from halfway, even, to the coast of New Holland. At the earliest we could not hope to reach it before another fortnight had passed.

I now come to an incident concerning which I am most reluctant to speak, and yet it must not be passed over in silence. There was, it seems, one man in our company so lost to all sense of his duty toward the others as to steal a part of our precious supply of pork. The theft amounted to one two-pound piece, and was committed during the night of this same day. With respect to the bread, Captain Bligh had put temptation beyond the power of anyone: it was kept under lock and key in the carpenter’s chest. But the pork was not so guarded. It was stored, wrapped in a cloth, in the bow. We had passed a wretched night, with a strong northeast wind, a rough sea, and perpetual rain. There had been no sleep for anyone. At dawn the next morning, Captain Bligh ordered a teaspoonful of rum and half an ounce of pork for our breakfast; and it was then that the theft was discovered. I well remember the look of horror in Mr. Cole’s face as he reported it. “There’s a piece missing, sir,” he said.