about four in the afternoon
After a time I would approach no more , for I was afraid ; I did not dare , the silence of the ship seemed so sacred and awful ; and till late afternoon I sat there , watching the black and massive hull . Above her water-line emerged all round a half-floating fringe of fresh-green sea-weed , proving old neglect ; an abortive attempt had apparently been made to lower , or take in , the larch-wood pram , for there she hung by a jammed davit-rope , stern up , bow in the water ; the only two arms of the windmill moved this way and that , through some three degrees , with an _ andante _ creaking sing-song ; some washed clothes , tied on the bow-sprit rigging to dry , were still there ; the iron casing all round the bluff bows was red and rough with rust ; at several points the rigging was in considerable tangle ; occasionally the boom moved a little with a tortured skirling cadence ; and the sail , rotten , I presume , from exposure -- for she had certainly encountered no bad weather -- gave out anon a heavy languid flap at a rent down the middle . Besides Sallitt , looking out there where he had jammed himself , I saw no one . By a paddle-stroke now , and another presently , I had closely approached her about four in the afternoon , though my awe of the ship was complicated by that perfume of hers , whose fearful effects I knew . My tentative approach , however , proved to me , when I remained unaffected , that , here and now , whatever danger there had been was past ; and finally , by a hanging rope , with a thumping desperation of heart , I clambered up her beam . * * * * * They had died , it seemed , very suddenly , for nearly all the twelve were in poses of activity . Egan was in the very act of ascending the companion-way ; Lamburn was sitting against the chart-room door , apparently cleaning two carbines ; Odling at the bottom of the engine-room stair seemed to be drawing on a pair of reindeer komagar ; and Cartwright , who was often in liquor , had his arms frozen tight round the neck of Martin , whom he seemed to be kissing , they two lying stark at the foot of the mizzen-mast .