John Holdsworth, Chief Mate by W. Clark Russell

Holdsworth regained his strength slowly, and on the fourth day Mr. Sherman, who attended him with the gentle and unobtrusive solicitude of a perfectly benevolent mind, suggested that a visit on deck might freshen him up and contribute to his recovery.

To this Holdsworth had been looking forward with indescribable eagerness, believing that the sight of the boat of which Mr. Sherman had spoken would recall his memory. His mind, indeed, presented a phenomenon. He remembered nothing -- literally _nothing_. His actual life, as he was then living it, practically dated from the moment of the return of his consciousness. All that had gone before was pitch darkness. That the faculty of memory was not _dead_, was proved by his capacity to remember his thoughts and feelings, the offices and faces of those who waited on him, the food he had eaten, the names of those he conversed with, during the time he had been in the cabin of the barque. But behind this was impenetrable gloom, every glance at which tortured him, so inexplicable was his helplessness to penetrate it.