Bartleby the Scrivener: A Tale of Wall Street

142 THE PIAZZA TALES
polishers ; and seizing Don Benito by the throat he
added, '
this plotting pirate means murder !
'
Here, in
apparent verification of the words, the servant, a dagger
in his hand, was seen on the rail overhead, poised, in the
act of leaping, as if with desperate fidelity to befriend
his master to the last ; while, seemingly to aid the
black, the three white sailors were trying to clamber
into the hampered bow. Meantime, the whole host of
negroes, as if inflamed at the sight of their jeopardised
captain, impended in one sooty avalanche over the
bulwarks.
All this, with what preceded, and what followed,
occurred with such involutions of rapidity, that past,
present, and future seemed one.
Seeing the negro coming, Captain Delano had flung
the Spaniard aside, almost in the very act of clutching
him, and, by the unconscious recoil, shifting his place,
with arms thrown up, so promptly grappled the servant
in his descent, that with dagger presented at Captain
Delano's heart, the black seemed of purpose to have
leaped there as to his mark. But the weapon was
wrenched away, and the assailant dashed down into the
bottom of the boat, which now, with disentangled oars,
began to speed through the sea.
At this juncture, the left hand of Captain Delano, on
one side, again clutched the half-reclined Don Benito,
heedless that he was in a speechless faint, while his right
foot, on the other side, ground the prostrate negro ;
and his right arm pressed for added speed on the after-
oar, his eye bent forward, encouraging his men to their
utmost.
But here, the officer of the boat, who had at last succeeded
in beating off
with face turned aft,
the towing sailors, and was now,
assisting the bowsman at his oar,
suddenly called to Captain Delano, to see what the