Explore "God and the Man" by Robert W. Buchanan on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Captain Higginbotham, surveying his new friends leisurely with an eye of profound experience, soon discovered that good seamanship was by no means the characteristic of either skipper or crew; that the former spent a good deal of his time in his berth, pipe in mouth, under the influence of the Indian narcotic and his national liquor, and that the latter sailed the ship pretty much as sweet fancy taught them. Fortunately, the wind was light and fair, the ship a tough and tight one; and for the rest, everybody was grimy, greasy, and very good- humoured.
During the evening following their rescue, while the ship was slipping along quietly before the same steady easterly wind, Higginbotham strolled forward, and saw Christian sitting alone on a coil of rope, with his head resting against the rail.