midnight
But come , here is the steward , so I suppose supper is ready , and if so we may as well go below and get it , for I must plead guilty to being most ravenously hungry . '' Notwithstanding which statement I could not avoid noticing that he toyed a great deal with his food and ate very little ; which was not to be wondered at under the circumstances , for I afterwards learned that while I was below in my berth , suspecting nothing worse than the purchase and transfer of a cargo of slaves from one ship to another , a most atrocious and cold-blooded act of piracy had been committed , and that , too , under the shadow and disguise of the British flag ; Mendouca having coolly hoisted British colours the moment that I left the deck , and , in the guise of a British cruiser , compelled the Portuguese brig to heave-to and disgorge her cargo ; after which he had confined the crew below , bound hand and foot , and had scuttled their ship , leaving them to perish in her when she went down ! But of this I had not the faintest suspicion until the tale was told me some time afterwards by one of the _ Francesca 's _ own crew . With the setting of the sun the wind evinced a very decided tendency to drop , growing steadily lighter all through the first watch , until when Mendouca relieved me at midnight the ship was moving at a rate of barely five knots , although she was carrying studding-sails on both sides ; and when I went on deck again at four o'clock next morning it was a flat calm , and the ship was lying motionless upon the water , with her head swung round to the south-east ; the swell , too , had gone down , and there was every appearance of the calm lasting for several hours at least . The appearance of the sun , as he rose , also confirmed this impression , the sky being -- for a wonder in that latitude -- perfectly cloudless , and of a clear , pure , soft , crystalline blue , into which the great luminary leapt in dazzling splendour , palpitating with breathless heat that promised to soon become almost unendurable . It was my custom to indulge in a saltwater bath every morning in the ship 's head , one of the men playing the hose upon me for a quarter of an hour or so , and never did that bath seem a greater luxury to me than on this particular morning , for the heat came with the sun , and I envied the fish their ability to escape it by sinking deep into the cool , blue , crystalline depths ; indeed I should most probably have been tempted to imitate them as far as possible by plunging overboard and swimming twice or thrice round the ship , had I not happened to have noticed a large shark under her counter , when , to test the clearness of the water , I happened to lean over the taffrail to look at the rudder and stern-post . Even the men dawdled over the job of washing decks that morning , using a much greater quantity of water than usual , and placing themselves where there was a chance to get the hose played upon their bare feet and legs .