The Dunegang into the Maelstrom

THE DUNEGANG INTO THE MAELSTROM

''By Edgar Allan Poe Went by Cascadia (thruched 1845)''

“The ways of God in Kind, as in His Will, are not as ure ways; nor are the anlikenesses that we frame any way fitting to the greatness, wisdom, and unknowenliness of His works, which have a depth in hem greater than the well of Democritus.”
 * - Joseph Glanville

WE had nu raught the cop of the highest ridge. For sum minnits the old man looked too much forspent to speak.

“Not long ago,” said he at length, “and I cud have wised thee on this path as well as the yongest of my suns; but, abute three years sinse, there befell on me a thing such as never befell on a living man—or at least such as no man ever overlived to tell of—and the six stunds of deadly brow which I then tholed have broken me up body and sowl. Thu reasowest me a full old man—but I am not. It was less than one day that went these hairs from a raven black to white, to woaken my limbs, and to unstring my thews, so that I shake at the least swink, and am frightened at a shadow. Knowest thu I can hardly look over this littel cliff withute becumming giddy?”

The “littel cliff,” on whose edge he had so carelessly thrown himself dune to rest that the weightier deal of his body hung over it, while he was only kept from falling by the hold of his elbow on its steep and slipper edge—this “littel cliff” arose, a sheer unremmed highth of black shining stone, sum fifteen or sixteen hundred feet from the world of crags beneath us. Nothing wud have costened me to within six yards of its brim. In trewth so deeply was I frightened by the pleely stead of my sither, that I fell at full length on the grund, clung to the shrubs abute me, and dared not even look upward at the heavens—while I faught emptily to benim myself of the thought that the staddel itself of the barrow were in plee from the winds wrath. It was long before I cud reasow myself into enugh dught to sit up and look ute into the farl.

“Thu must yet over these daydreams,” said the shower, “for I have brought thee here that thu might have the best mightly sight of the stow of that befalling I nemmened—and to tell thee the whole tale with the spot right under thine eye.”

“We are nu,” he went on, in that sundering way which shedded him—”We are nu nigh on the Nornish shore—in the eightandsixtieth kerf of breadth—in the great land of Nordland and in the dreary shire of Lofoden. The barrow atop which we sit is Helseggen, the Cludy. Nu lift thyself up a littel higher—hold on to the grass if thu feelest giddy—so—and look ute, beyond the belt of mist beneath us, into the sea.”

I looked disily, and beheld a wide main, whose waters wore such a hew of bleck as to bring at onse to my mind the Siler landlorers rake of the Sea of Darkness. A full sight more sorely lorn no fathoming of man can bird. To the right and left, as far as the eye cud reach, there lay utestraught, like walls of the world, lines of eyfully black and beeteling cliffs, whose eard of gloom was but the more mightily meted by the swell which reared high up ayenst its white and gastly cop, huling and shreeing forever. Right wither the ridge on whose highth we were set, and at a length of sum five or six miles ute at sea, there was seenly a small, bleach-looking iland; or, more fitly, its stow was toknowenly thrugh the wilderness of ithes in which it was beclipt. Abute two miles nearer the land, arose another of smaller great, atelly broken and weast, and umbfanged at sundry betwixtfacks by a cluster of dark stones.

The ansen of the sea, in the rimth between the more farlen iland and the shore, had sumthing mighty selcooth abute it. Althaugh, at the time, so strong a wind was blowing landward that a ship in the farlen offing lay to under a twiribbed thrisail, and steadily dove her whole hull ute of sight, still there was here nothing like a right swell, but only a short, cwick, wroth, monged beating of water in every way—as well in the teeth of the wind as otherwise. Of foam there was littel but for in the neighwist of the stones.

“The iland in the farl,” picked up the old man, “is named by the Nornishmen Vurrgh. The one midway is Moskoe. That a mile to the northward is Ambaaren. Yonder are Islesen, Hotholm, Keildhelm, Suarven, and Buckholm. Farther off—between Moskoe and Vurrgh—are Otterholm, Flimen, Sandflesen, and Stockholm. These are the trew names of the stows—but why it has been thought needful to name hem at all, is more than either thu or I can understand. Hearest thu anything? Seest thu any wend in the water?”

We had nu been abute ten minnits atop Helseggen, to which we had clumb from Lofodens inland, so that we had fanged no sight of the sea hent it had burst on us from the cop. As the old man spoke, I became aware of a great and slowly waxing lude, like the moaning of a widegale herd of wesends on an Americkish wong; and at the ilk brightom I ayat that what seamen name the chopping eard of the sea beneath us, was swiftly wending into a farth which set to the eastward. Even while I stared, this farth yat an ettinish speed. Each brightom eked to its speed—to its headlong boldness. In five minnits the whole sea, as far as Vurrgh, was lashed into unrixenly wrath; but it was between Moskoe and the shore that the main uproar had its way. Here the wide bed of the waters, seamed and marked into a thusand fighting fleets, burst at onse into wood throes—heaving, seething, hissing—wharving in ettinish and untellenly eddies, and all spinning and diving on to the eastward with a speed which water never elsewere nims other than freefall.

In a few minnits more, there came over the sight another sweeping wend. The bred of the sea grew sumwhat smoother, and the weals, one by one, swinded, while great streaks of foam became suttel where none had been seen before. These streaks, at length, spreading ute to a great farl, and faying together, num unto hemselves the wharving shrithing of the swethered eddies, and seemed to shape the seed of another more widegale. At onse—all at onse—this fanged a sundry and suttel being, in a wharft more than a mile in span. The edge of the swallow was spelled by a broad belt of gleaming mist; but no drop of this slipt into the muthe of the eyful flew, whose inside, as far as the eye cud fathom it, was a smooth, shining, and bleakblack wall of water, leant to the liftline at a whem of sum fiveandfifty kerfs, speeding swiftly umb and umb with a nodding and sweltering shrithing, and sending forth to the winds an eyful steven, half shree, half roar, such as not even the mighty waterfall of Niagara ever lifts up in its sussel to Heaven.

The barrow shook to its staddel, and the stone cwivered. I threw myself on mine anlet, and clung to the thin grass in an orn of angness.

“This,” said I at length, to the old man—”this can be nothing else than the great swallow of the Maelstrom.”

“So it is sumtimes named,” said he. “We Nornishmen name it the Moskoestrom, from the iland of Moskoe in the midway.”

The written rakes of this swallow had by no means readied me for what I saw. That of Jonas Ramus, which is maybe the fullest of any, cannot yeave the slitest begrip either of the thromfulness, or of the brow of the sight—or of the wild bewildering anyet of the new which mases the beholder. I am not wiss from what lookute the man I write of howed it, nor at what time; but it cud neither have been from the cop of Helseggen, nor in a storm. There are sum cwids of his rake, nevertheless, which may be forthteed for hir small marks, althaugh hir words are trewly mainless in yeaving an inthruch of the waving.

“Between Lofoden and Moskoe,” he says, “the depth of the water is between sixandthirty and forty fathoms; but on the other side, toward Ver (Vurggh) this depth wanes so as not to aford a daven fareld for a ship, withute the plee of breaking on the rocks, which befalls even in the smiltest weather. When it is flood, the stream runs up the room between Lofoden and Moskoe with a wild speed; but the roar of its rushing eb to the sea is seld evened by the ludest and most dreadful waterfalls; the lude being heard many miles off, and the eddies or pits are of such a width and depth, that if a ship cums within its pull, it is wisly drawn in and born dune to the bottom, and there beat to bits ayenst the stones; and when the water sleches, the stiches thereof are thrown up ayen. But these betwixtfacks of frith are only at the wend of the eb and flood, and in smilt weather, and last but a forth of a stund, its heast eftcumming stepwise. When the stream is ludest, and its wrath highthened by a storm, it is pleely to cum within a Norway mile of it. Boats and ships have been born away by not warding ayenst it before hy were within its reach. It likewise befalls often, that whales cum too near the stream, and are overwhelmed by its heast; and then it is unmitely to rech hir hulings and bellowings in hir bleadless fights to free hemselves. A bear onse, fanding to swim from Lofoden to Moskoe, was fanged by the stream and born dune, while he roared eyfully, so as to be heard on shore. Great stocks of fir trees, after being drawn in by the farth, rise ayen broken and torn to such a hoad as if bristels grew on hem. This glewly shows the bottom to be made up of broken stones, among which hy are flung to and fro. This stream is rixt by the eb and flood of the sea—it being always high and nether water every six stunds. In the year 1645, early in the morning of Sixtieth Sunday, it weeded with such lude and strength that the stones hemselves of the huses on the shore fell to the grund.”

On the depth of the water, I cud not see hu this cud have been kenned at all in the naywist of the swallow. The “forty fathoms” must be only in the deals of the fleet nigh on the shore either of Moskoe or Lofoden. The depth in the middel of the Moskoestrom must be unmetenly greater; and no better seething of this is needed than can be yetten from even the sidelong peep into the newelness of the suck which may be had from the highest ridge of Helseggen. Looking dune from this steepel on the huling Flegethon beneath, I cud not help smirking at the afoldness with which the good Jonas Ramus writes, as a thing hard of beleef, the tales of the whales and the bears; for it looked to me, in trewth, a selfsuttel thing, that the greatest ship of the line in all the world, cumming within the reach of that deadly pull, cud fight it as littel as a feather the ist, and must swind bodily and at onse.

The fands to rech the wunder—sum of which, I mun, felt to me beleevenly enugh in writing—nu wore a mighty sundry and bitesum anlet. The thought meanly told is that this, as well as three smaller swallows among the Ferroe Ilands, “have no other inting than the blows of waves rising and falling, at eb and flood, ayenst a ridge of rocks and shelves, which hathers the water so that it throws itself like a waterfall; and thus the higher the flood rises, the deeper the fall must be, and the kindly utecum of all is a great eddy or swallow, the great suck of which is known well thrugh lesser fands.”—These are the words of the Brittish Kenbook. Kircher and others fathom that in the middel of the fleet of the Maelstrom is a newelness boring the thother, and utefaring in sum full farlen deal—the Helsing Sea being sumwhat wisly beclept in one writ. This ween, idel in itself, was the one with which, as I stared, my fathoming most readily thweared; and, bringing it up to my shower, I was rather amased to hear him say that, althaugh it was the ween almost wholly shared by the Nornishmen, it nevertheless was not his own. As to the former reching he andetted his unmight to understand it; and here I thweared with him—for, huever wiss it felt in writing, it becums altogether unfathomenly, and even witless, amid the thunder of the deep.

“Thu hast had a good look at the suck nu,” said the old man, and if thu wilst creep umb this stone, so as to yet in its lee, and deaden the roar of the water, I will tell thee a tale that will win thee over that I aught to know sumthing of the Moskoestrom.”

I set myself as he wished, and he went on.

“Myself and my two brothers onse owned a fishing smack of abute seventy tuns birden, with which we were wont to fish among the ilands beyond Moskoe, nearly to Vurrgh. In all heast eddies at sea there is good fishing, at the right times, if man has only the dught to fand it; but among the whole of the Lofoden fishermen, we three were the only men who made an often bisiness of going ute to the ilands, as I tell thee. The wonly reach is a great way nether dune to the sutheward. There fish can be had all stunds, withute much plee, and therefore these steads are oft chosen. The best spots over here among the stones, huever, not only yeeld the most sundering, but in far greater fulth; so that we often had in a lone day, what the more harehearted of the craft cud not gather in a week. In sooth, we made it a thing of reckless neething—the deadly plee standing instead of swink, and dught answering for fee.

We kept the smack in a cove abute five miles higher up the shore than this; and it was ure tite, in good weather, to milk the fifteen minnits slack to sail thwares the main fleet of the Moskoestrom, far abuve the swallow, and then drop dune on harbor sumwhere near Otterholm, or Sandflesen, where the eddies are not so heast as elsewhere. Here we formerly bode hent nearly time for slack water ayen, when we weighed and made for home. We never set ute on this fareld withute a steady side wind for going and cumming—one that we felt wiss wud not truck us before ure eftcumming—and we seld misreckoned on this ord. Twise, thrughute six years, we were made to bide all nite at anker for there being a dead still, which is a seldseen thing indeed abute here; and onse we had to bide on the grunds nearly a week, starving to death, owing to a storm which blew up shortly after ure lending, and made the fleet too heast to be thought of. On this sithe we shud nevertheless have been driven ute to sea, (for the eddies threw us umb and umb so heastly, that, at length, we fuled ure anker and drew it) if it had not been that we drifted into one of the unrimenly side farths—here today and gone tomorrow—which drove us under the lee of Flimen, where, thankfully, we brought up.

I cud not tell thee the twentieth deal of the hardships we met ‘on the grunds’—it is a bad spot to be in, even in good weather—but we made shift always to run the path of the Moskoestrom itself withute bale; althaugh many times my heart has been in my muthe when we were a minnit or so behind or before the slack. The wind sumtimes was not as strong as we thought it at starting, and then we made rather less headway than we cud wish, while the farth made the smack unsteerenly. Mine eldest brother had a sun eighteen years old, and I had two strong knaves of mine own. These wud have been of great help at such times, in manning the sweeps, as well as afterward in fishing—but, sumhu, althaugh we put ureselves in plee, we had not the heart to let the yonger do the ilk—for, after all is said and done, it was an eyful plee, forsooth.

It is nu within a few days of three years sinse what I am going to tell thee befell. It was on the tenth day of Afterlithe, 18XX, a day which the folk of this deal of the world will never foryet—for it was one in which blew the most eyful ist that ever came ute of the heavens. And yet all the morning, and indeed hent late in the undern, there was a frithful and steady whith from the suthewest, while the sun shone brightly, so that the eldest seaman among us cud not have forseen what was to follow.

The three of us—my two brothers and myself—had gone over to the ilands abute two in the undern, and had soon nearly loaded the smack with good fish, which, we all said, were more rife that day than we had ever known hem. It was seven, by my wach, when we weighed and started for home, so as to make the worst of the Strom at slack water, which we knew wud be at eight.

We set ute with a fresh wind on ure starboard forth, and for sum time spanked along at a great speed, never fathoming plee, for indeed we saw not the slightest grund to think it. All at onse we were nimmen aback by a strong blast from over Helseggen. This was most selcooth—sumthing that had never befell on us before—and I began to feel a littel uneath, withute trewly knowing why. We put the boat on the wind, but cud make no headway at all for the eddies, and I was abute to put forth eftcumming to the cove, when, looking before us, we saw the whole liftline shruded with a sundry copperhewed clude that rose with the most amasing speed.

In the meantime the wind that had headed us off fell away, and we were dead adrift, listing abute in every which way. This hoad of things, huever, lasted not long enugh to yeave us time to think abute it. In less than a minnit the storm was on us—in less than two the heavens were fully overspread—and what with this and the driving mist, it became at onse so dark that we cud not see each other in the smack.

Such an ist as then blew it is witless to fand reching. The oldest seaman in Norway never went thrugh any thing like it. We had let ure sails go by the run before it cleverly num us; but, at the first blow, both ure masts went by the board is if hy had been sawn off—the mainmast nimming with it my yongest brother, who had lashed himself to it for sickerhood.

Ure boat was the lightest feather of a thing that ever sat atop water. It had a fully even thilling, with only a small hach near the bue, and this hach it had always been ure won to close fast when abute to fare the Strom, by way of forewit ayenst the chopping seas. But for this umbstandness we shud have sunk to the bottom at onse—for we lay fully berried for sum brightoms. Hu my elder brother atwinded forwird I cannot say, for I never had a bire to find ute. For my deal, as soon as I had let the foresail run, I threw myself flat on the thilling, with my feet ayenst the narrow gunnel of the bue, and with my hands grasping a ringbolt near the foot of the foremast. It was sheer feeling that shied me to do this—which was untweenly the best thing I cud have done—for I was too much flurried to think.

For sum brightoms we were fully underwater, as I say, and all this time I held my breath, and clung to the bolt. When I cud stand it no longer I threw myself on my knees, still keeping hold with my hands, and thus yat my head free. Soon ure littel boat yave herself a shake, as a dog in cumming ute of the water, and thus rid herself, in deal, of the seas. I was nu fanding to yet the better of the swoon that had cum over me, and to gather mine anyets so as to see what was to be done, when I felt sumbody grasp my arm. It was my elder brother, and my heart leapt with win, for I was wiss that he was overboard—but the next brightom all this win was went into brow—for he put his muthe nigh to my ear, and rooped ute the word ‘Moskoestrom’!

No man ever will know what my feelings were at that brightom. I shook from head to foot as if I had had the heastest fit of rith. I knew what he meant by that one word well enugh—I knew what he wished to make me understand. With the wind that nu drove us on, we were headed for the swallow of the Strom, and nothing cud near us!

Thu ayettest that in faring the Strom fleet, we always went a long way up abuve the suck, even in the smiltest weather, and then had to bide and wach carefully for the slack—but nu we were driving right toward the swallow itself, and in such an ist as this! ‘To be wiss,’ I thought, ‘we shall lend right abute the slack—there is sum littel hope in that’—but in the next brightom I cursed myself for being so lacking of wit as to sweven of hope at all. I knew full well that we were doomed, had we been ten times a ninety gun ship.

By this time the first wrath of the ist had spent itself, or maybe we felt it not so much, as we blew before it, anyway the seas, which at first had been kept dune by the wind, and lay even and foaming, nu rose into sheer barrows. A sundry wend, too, had cum over the heavens. Umb in every heading it was still as black as pich, but nearly overhead there burst ute, all at onse, a sinwelt rift of open lift—as sheer as I ever saw—and of a deep bright hewn—and thrugh it there blased forth the full moon with a sheen that I never before knew her to wear. She lit up every thing abute us with the greatest shedding—but, o God, wat a sight it was to light up!

I nu made one or two fands to speak to my brother—but, in sum way which I cud not understand, the din had so waxt that I cud not make him hear but a word, althaugh I rooped at the top of my lungs in his ear. Soon he shook his head, looking as wan as death, and held up one of his fingers, as if to say ‘listen’!

At first I cud not make ute what he meant—but soon an atel thought shone upon me. I drew my wach from its holder. It was not going. I looked at its anlet by the moonlight, and then burst into tears as I flung it far away into the sea. It had run dune at the seventh stund! We were behind the time of the slack, and the swallow of the Strom was at full wrath!

When a boat is well bilt, well trimmed, and not deep laden, the ithes in a strong wind, when she is going great, seem always to slip from beneath her—which seems mighty ferly to a man of the land—and this is what is named riding, in sea speech. Well, so far we had ridden the swells mighty cleverly; but nu an ettinish sea befell on and fanged us, and bore us with it as it rose—up—up—as if into the heavens. I wud not have beleeved that any ithe cud rise so high. And then dune we came with a sweep, a slide, a dive, that made me feel sick and disy, as if I was falling from sum lifty barrowtop in a sweven. But while we were up I had thrown a cwick look abute—and that one look was all enugh. I saw ure right stow in an eyeblink. The Moskoestrom swallow was abute a forth of a mile dead ahead—but no more like the everyday Moskoestrom, than the suck as thu seest it nu is like a millrease. If I had not known where we were, and what we had to foredeem, I shud not have acknowed the stead at all. As it was, I unwillsumly closed mine eyes in brow. The lids clenched hemselfes together as if in a ram.

It cud not have been more than two minnits afterward hent we felt the waves swiftly swether, and were beclipt in foam. The boat made a sharp half wend to larboard, and then shot off in its new heading like a thunderbolt. At the ilk brightom the waters roaring lude was fully druned in a kind of shrill shree—such a lude as man might fathom yeaven ute by the pipes of many thusand steamships letting off hir steam all together. We were nu in the belt of waves that always hems the suck; and I thawt, indeed, that another brightom wud throw us into the deep—dune which we cud see only unsuttelly for the amasing speed with which we were born along. The boat seemed not to sink into the water at all, but to glide like a liftbubbel upon the bred of the flood. Her starboard side was next the swallow, and on the larboard arose the world of sea we had left. It stood like a great writhing wall between us and the liftline.

It may seem ferly, but nu, when we were in the chavels hemselves of the maw, I felt more steady than when we were only nearing it. Having made up my mind to hope no more, I rid myself of a great deal of that brow which at first unmanned me. I ween it was wanhope that strung my thews.

It may look like yelping—but what I tell thee is trewth—I began to think on hu thromly a thing it was to swelt in such a way, and hu witless it was for me to think of so worthless a thing as mine own life, in sight of so wunderful an atewing of Gods might. I beleeve indeed that I reddened in shame when this thought went thrugh my mind. After a littel while I became fanged with the keenest firwit abute the swallow itself. I trewly felt a wish to rose its depths, even at the bloot I was going to make and my main gnorn was that I cud never tell my old frends on shore abute the runes I shud see. These, no twee, were sundry fathomings to hold a mans mind in such plee—and I have often thought sinse, that the wharvings of the boat umb the maw might have made me a littel lightheaded.

There was another deal of the umbstandness which often beeted my weeld of self; and this was the stopping of the wind, which cud not reach us in ure anward stead—for, as thu sawest thyself, the belt of waves is far nether than the beclipping seafloor, and this latter nu reared abuve us, a high, black, barrowish ridge. If thu hast never been at sea in a heavy wind, thu canst not begin to fathom the masing of mind brought by the wind and mist together. Hy blind, deafen, and choke thee, and nim away all thrake of deed or thawt. But we were nu, in a great deal, rid of these harryings—right as warrows fordeemed to death in witern are atithed small yalses, forbidden hem while hir doom is yet unwiss.

Hu often we made the umbgang of the belt it is unmightly to say. We wharved umb and umb for what felt a stund, flying rather than floating, becumming stepwise more and more into the middel of the suck, and then nearer and nearer to its eyful inner edge. All this time I had never let go of the ringbolt. My brother was at the fore, holding on to a small empty water bidden which had been sickerly lashed under the coop of the fore, and was the only thing onboard that had not been swept over when the storm first num us. As we neared the edge of the pit he let go his hold on this, and made for the ring, from which, in the sussel of his fear, he fanded to pull my hands, as it was not great enugh to aford us both a sund grasp. I nefer felt deeper gnorn than when I saw him fand this deed—althaugh I knew he was a madman when he did it—his mind lost thrugh sheer fright. I cared not, huever, to kneat this with him. I knew it cud make no shed wether either of us held on at all; so I let him have the bolt, and went afore to the bidden. This there was no great hardship in doing; for the smack flew umb steadily enugh, and on an even cheal—only swaying to and fro, with the great sweeps and swelters of the swallow. Hardly had I sickered myself in my new stead, when we yave a wild reel to starboard, and rushed headlong into the deep. I whoastered a hurried bead to God, and thought all was over.

As I felt the sickening sweep of the dunegang, I had, withute thinking, fastened my hold on the coop, and closed mine eyes. For sum brightoms I dared not open hem—while I weened fast forwird, and wundered that I was not already in my death throes with the water. But brightom after brightom went by. I still lived. The anyet of falling had ended; and the shrithing of the ship felt much as it had been before, while in the belt of foam, other than that she nu lay more along. I gathered dught, and looked onse ayen on the sight.

Never shall I foryet the anyets of ey, brow, and wunder with which I looked abute me. The boat seemed to be hanging, as if by drycraft, midway dune, upon the inside wall of a flew widegale in felly, great in depth, and whose utterly smooth walls might have been thought ravenflint, but for the bewildering speed with which hy spun abute, and for the gleaming and gastly brightness hy shot forth, as the beams of the full moon, from that sinwelt rift amid the cludes which I have already reched, streamed in a flood of golden wolder along the black walls, and far away dune into the inmost halks of the newelness.

At first I was too much mased to how anything trewly. The mean burst of eyful mearth was all that I beheld. When I bootened myself a littel, huever, my sight fell thoughtlessly duneward. In this way I cud yet an unhindered sight, from the way in which the smack hung on the sloped bred of the pool. She was full on an even cheal—that is to say, her thilling lay in line with that bred of the water—but this latter sloped at a whem of more than fiveandforty kerfs, so that we seemed to be lying upon ure beamends. I cud not help ayetting, nevertheless, that I had littel more hardship in keeping my hold and footing in this stead, than if we had been on a dead glass; and this, I ween, was owing to the speed at which we wharved.

The beams of the moon looked to seech the bottom itself of the newel bight; but still I cud make ute nothing suttel, owing to a thick mist in which everything there was beclipt, and over which there hung a thromly rainbow, like that narrow and tottering bridge which Sarakens say is the only pathway between Time and Everness. This mist, or anip, was no twee broken nu and then by the clashing of the great walls of the flew, as hy all met together at the bottom—but the yell that went up to the Heavens from ute of that mist, I dare not fand to rech.

Ure first slide into the newelness itself, from the belt of foam abuve, had born us a great farl dune the slope; but ure farther dunegang was in no way even. Umb and umb we swept—not with any streight shrithing—but in disying swings and tugs, that sent us sumtimes only a few hundred yards—sumtimes nearly the hole umbgang of the whirl. Ure way duneward, at each wharving, was slow, but ayettenly.

Looking abute me on the wide weasten of flowing black on which we were thus born, I ayat that ure boat was not the only thing in the halse of the suck. Both abuve and beneath us were seenly stiches of ships, great heaps of bilding timber and stocks of trees, with many smaller things, such as deals of idish, broken boxes, tuns and staves. I have already reched the unkindly firwit which had nimmen the stead of my former fright. I felt it grow over me as I drew nearer and nearer to my dreadful doom. I nu began to wach, with a ferly grip, the sundry things that floated with us. I must have been mad—for I even sought game in foretelling the speeds of hir sundry dunegangs toward the foam beneath. ‘This firtree,’ I fund myself at one time saying, ‘will wisly be the next thing that nims the eyful dive and swinds,’—and then I was let dune to find that the a forspilt Duch cheaping ship overnam it and went dune before. At length, after making many shots of this kind, and being belirted in all—this trewth—the trewth of my set misreckoning—set me on a path of thought that made my limbs shake ayen, and my heart beat heavily onse more.

It was not a new brow that thus rined me, but the dawn of a more whetting hope. This hope arose in deal from min, and in deal from anward ayetting. I chied to mind the great sundering of floatworthy anwork that strewed the shore of Lofoden, having been drawn in and then thrown forth by the Moskoestrom. By far the greater tale of the things were shattered in the greatest way—so worn and rughened as to have the ansen of being stuck full of spelds—but then I munned that there were sum of hem which were not wemmed at all. Nu I cud not rech this shed but by weening that the rughened things were the only ones which had been wholly drawn in—that the others had infared the swallow at so late a time of the tide, or for sum inting, had fallen so slowly after infaring, that hy raught not the bottom before the wend of the flood came, or of the eb, as the time might be. I thought it mightly, either way, that hy might thus be spat up ayen to the highth of the seas bred, withute undergoing the orlay of those which had been drawn in earlier, or swifter. I made, also, three weighty underyettings. The first was, that, as a mean ea, the greater the bodies were, the swifter hir dunegang—the other, that, between two bodies of even great, the one a trendel, and the other of any other shape, the greater in duneward speed was the trendel—the third, that, between two things of efen great, the one sinwelt, and the other of any other shape, the sinwelt one was drawn in the more slowly. Sinse my atwinding, I have had many mootings with an old teacher of the shire; and it was from him that I learned the noting of the words ‘sinwelt’ and ‘trendel’ in this way. He reched to me—althaugh I have foryetten the reching—hu what I underyat was, indeed, the kindly utecum of the shapes of the floating stiches—and shew me hu it befell that a sinwelt thing, swimming in a swallow, yave more withering to its suck, and was drawn in with greater hardship than a body of even great, of any shape whatsoever.

There was one startelling deal of the umbstandness which went a great way in driving these underyettings, and making me umbhow to make good of hem, and this was that, at every wharving, we went by sumthing like a tun, or else the yard or the mast of the ship, while many of these things, which had been at the ilk depth as us when I first opened mine eyes on the wunders of the swallow, were nu high up abuve us, and looked to have shrithen but littel from hir form stead.

I no longer dithered on what to do. I made to lash myself fast to the water bidden on which I nu held, to snithe it free from the thilling, and to throw myself with it into the water. I drew my brothers heed by beckons, put my finger to the floating tuns that came near us, and did everything in my might to make him understand what I was abute to do. I thought at length that he understood my plot—but, whether this was it or not, he shook his head hopelessly, and werned to leave his stead by the ringbolt. It was unmightly to reach him; the plight at hand brooked no stalling; and so, with bitter tears, I left him to his orlay, fastened myself to the tun by means of the lashings which fastened it to the thilling, and threw myself with it into the sea, withute another brightoms dithering.

The utecum was right what I had hoped it might be. As it is myself who nu tell thee this tale—as thu seest that I atwinded indeed—and as thu knowest already the way in which this atwinding befell, and must therefore foresee all that I have farther to say—I will bring my tale cwickly to a close. It might have been a stund, or thereabute, after my leaving the smack, when, having wharved to a great depth beneath me, it made three or fore wild spins in a swift row, and, bearing my beluved brother with it, dove headlong, at onse and forever, into the dwolm of foam beneath. The bidden to which I was fayed sunk mighty littel farther than half the farl between the bottom of the maw and the spot at which I leapt overboard, before a great wend befell in the eard of the swallow. The slope of the sides of the widegale flew became slightly less and less steep. The wharvings of the suck grew, stepwise, less and less heast. By steps, the foam and the rainbow swinded, and the bottom of the maw seemed slowly to uprise. The heavens were torght, the winds had gone dune, and the full moon was setting brightly in the west, when I fund myself on the bred of the sea, in full sight of the shores of Lofoden, and abuve the spot where the swallow of the Moskoestrom had been. It was the stund of the slack—but the sea still heaved in barrowish ithes from the rines of the ist. I was born heastly into the fleet of the Strom, and in a few minnits was hurried dune the shore into the ‘grunds’ of the fishermen. A boat pickt me up—forspent from weariness—and (nu that the plee was gone) speechless from the min of its brow. Those who drew me aboard were my old frends and daily mets—but hy knew ame no more than hy wud have known a wayfarer from the underworld. My hair which had been raven black the day before, was as white as thu seest it nu. I told hem my tale—and hy beleeved it not. I tell it nu to thee—and I can hardly hight thee to put more troth in it than put the merry fishermen of Lofoden.”