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Provisions had dwindled to one fish a day;
and scarcely a pint of water for each man was left in the hold. In
flying from Siberian exile, were they courting a worse fate?
Stephanow, the criminal convict, who had crossed Siberia with the Pole,
dashed on deck demanding a better allowance of water as the ship
entered warmer and warmer zones. The next thing the Pole knew,
Stephanow had burst open the barrel hoops of the water kegs to quench
his thirst. By the time the guard had gone down the main hatch to
intercept him, Stephanow and a band of Russian mutineers had trundled
the brandy casks to the deck and were in a wild debauch. The main
hatch was clapped down, leaving the mutineers in possession of the
deck, till all fell in drunken torpor, when Benyowsky rushed his
soldiers up the fore scuttle, snapped handcuffs on {126} the rebels,
and tied them to the masts. In the midst of this disorder, such a
hurricane broke over the ocean that the tossing yard-arms alternately
touched water.
To be sure, Benyowsky had escaped exile; but his ship was a hornets'
nest.


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