John Barth - The Sot-Weed Factor

It was at this least fortunate of moments that Ebenezer, sickened anew by the tidings of his ruin, leaned out again over the rail: the fiddle-tight shroud lashed back and smacked him on the transom, and he was horrified to find himself, for an instant, actually in the sea beside the ship! No one saw him go by the board; the officers and crew had their hands full, and Bertrand, unable to look his master in the eye during the confession, still cowered at the rail with his face in his arms. He could not shout for coughing up sea-water, but nothing could have been done to save him even in the unlikely event that anyone heard his cries. In short, it would have been all over with him then and there had not the same wind that formerly returned his heavings to him now blown the top off the next great wave: crest, spray, and senseless poet tumbled back aboard, along with numerous tons of green Atlantic Ocean, and for better or worse the Laureate was safe.

However, he did not regain his consciousness at once. For what could to him have been as well an hour or a year he languished in a species of euphoria, oblivious to his surroundings and to the passage of time, even to the fact that he was safe. It was a dizzy, dreamlike state, for the most part by no means unpleasant, though interrupted now and then by short periods of uncertain struggling accompanied by vague pain. Sometimes he dreamed — not nightmares at all but oddly tranquil visions. Two recurred with some frequency: the first and most mysterious was of twin alabaster mountain cones, tall and smoothly polished; old men were seated on the peaks, and around the bases surged a monstrous activity the nature of which he could not make out. The other was a recapitulation of his accident, in a strangely altered version: he was in the water beside the Poseidon, but the day was gloriously bright instead of stormy; the tepid sea was green, glass calm, and not even wet; the ship, though every sail was full, moved not an inch away; not Bertrand, but his sister Anna and his friend Henry Burlingame watched him from the quarterdeck, smiling and waving, and instead of terror it was ecstasy that filled his poet's breast!

When at length he came fully to his senses, the substance of these dreams defied recall, but their tranquility came with him to the waking world. He lay peacefully for a long time with his eyes open, admitting reality a fact at a time into his consciousness. To begin with, he was alive — a certain dizziness, some weakness of the stomach, and pains in his buttocks vouched for that, though he felt them with as much detachment as if the ailing members were not his. He remembered the accident without alarm, but knew neither how it had occurred nor what had saved him. Even the memory that Bertrand had lost all his money, which followed immediately after, failed to ruffle his serenity. Gradually he understood that he was lying in a hammock in the fo'c'sle: he knew the look of the place from his earlier confinement there. The room was shadowy and full of the smells of lamp-oil and tobacco-smoke; he heard occasional short laughs and muttered curses, and the slap of playing-cards; somewhere near at hand a sleeper snored. It was night, then. Last of all he realized that the ship was riding steady as a church, at just the slightest angle of heel: the storm had passed, and also the dangerous period of high seas and no wind that often follows storms at sea: the Poseidon was making gentle way.

Though he was loath to leave that pleasant country where his spirit had lately traveled, he presently swung his legs out of the hammock and sat up. In other hammocks all around him men were sleeping, and four sailors played at cards on a table near the center of the room.

"Marry!" one of them cried. "There stirs our sleeping beauty!" The rest turned round with various smiles to look.

"Good evening," Ebenezer said. His voice was weak, and when he stood erect his legs gave way, and the pain in his buttocks recommenced. He grasped a bulkhead for support.

"What is't, lad?" a smiling jack inquired. "Got a gimp?"

At this the party laughed aloud, and though the point of the joke escaped him, Ebenezer smiled as well: the strange serenity he'd waked with made it of no importance that their laughter was doubtless at his expense.

"Belike I took a fall," he said politely. "I hurt a little here and there."

" 'Twere a nine-day wonder if ye didn't!" an old fellow cackled, and Ebenezer recognized that same Ned who'd first delivered him into Bertrand's presence and had pinched him so cruelly into the bargain. The others laughed again, but bade their shipmate be silent.

A third sailor, somewhat less uncouth appearing than the rest, made haste to say, "What Ned means is, small wonder ye've an ache or two where the mizzen shroud struck ye." He indicated a small flask near at hand. "Come have a dram to steady yourself while the mate's on deck."

"I thank you," Ebenezer said, and when he had done shivering from the rum he mildly asked, "How is't I'm here?"

"We found ye senseless on the main deck in the storm," the sailor said. "Ye'd near washed through the scuppers."

"Chips yonder used your berth for planking," old Ned added gleefully, and indicated the sailor who had spoken first — a lean, sturdy fellow in his forties.

"No offense intended, mind," said the carpenter, playing another card. "We was taking water aft, and all my planks was washed by the board. I asked in the 'tween decks which berth to use, and yours was the one they showed me."

"Ah well, I'll not miss their company, I think." On further questioning Ebenezer learned that his unconsciousness had lasted three days and nights, during which time he'd had no food at all. He was ravenously hungry; the cook, rather expecting him to die, had left no rations for him, but the crewmen readily shared their bread and cheese. They showed considerable curiosity about his three-day coma: in particular, had he felt not anything at all? His assurance that he had not seemed greatly to amuse them.

"Out on't, then!" the carpenter declared. " 'Tis over and done with, mate, and if aught's amiss, bear in mind we thought ye a dying man."

"Amiss?" Ebenezer did not understand. By this time the rum had warmed his every member, and the edge was off his hunger. In the lantern light the fo'c'sle looked quite cozy. He had not lately met with such hospitality as had been shown him by these uncouth sailors, who doubtless knew not even his pseudonym, to say nothing of his real identity. "If aught's amiss," he asserted warmly, " 'tis that in my muddled state I've made no proper thanks for all your kindness. Would God I'd pence to pay you for't, though I knew 'twas natural goodness moved you and not the landsman's grubby wish for gold. But I'm a pauper."

"Think never a fart of't," one of the men replied. " 'Tis your master's lookout. Drink up, now."

The Laureate smiled at their innocence and took another drink. Should he tell them whom in fact they were so kind to? No, he decided affectionately; let virtue be its own reward. He called to mind tales of kings in humble dress, going forth among their subjects; of Christ himself, who sometimes traveled incognito. Doubtless they would one day learn the truth, from some poem or other that he'd write: then the adventure would become a legend of the fo'c'sles and a telling anecdote in biographies to come.

The sailors' cordial attitude prevailed through the following fortnight, as did the poet's remarkable tranquility. This latter, at least, he came increasingly to understand: the second of his euphoric visions had come back to him, and he saw in it, with a quiet thrill, a mystic affirmation of his calling, such as those once vouchsafed to the saints. What was this ship, after all, but the Ship of Destiny, from which in retribution for his doubts he had been cast? What was the ocean but a Font of Rededication, a moral bath to cleanse him of despair and restore him to the Ship? The message was unequivocal even without the additional, almost frightening miracle that he had unwittingly predicted it! Hence Burlingame's presence on the dream ship, for he it was, in the King o' the Seas (that is to say, Poseidon!) who had scoffed at the third line of Ebenezer's quatrain —