This would have placed the Hili-lites about eleven days in
arrear of Pym's count--a difference which, under the circumstances,
Peters might easily have overlooked.
"Not many weeks after the rescue of Lilania, she and Pym were married
according to the usual form of Hili-li. The wedding ceremony was a very
quiet one. I have thought that perhaps the customs of Hili-li might
account for the lack of any festivity; and, again, that the Ahpilus
incident may have precluded all social gaiety at such a time, the
injured man being still in a precarious condition."
Here Bainbridge paused for a moment, took a turn or two across the
floor, relit the long-neglected cigar that he held in his fingers,
seated himself, and continued:
The SEVENTEENTH Chapter
It is pleasant to dwell on this period in the life of young Pym. We
think of his home on the far-away island of Nantucket, with the loving
mother, the proud father, the doting old grandfather--all cast aside,
and probably forever, by the momentary folly of a boy; then of his
connection with the ship-mutiny--unquestionably one of the most horrible
positions in which it is ever the fate of man to stand; the death of his
friend and his friend's father; the shipwreck, and the long, lonely days
of watching, in hunger and thirst, for a sail; the final loss of all
companions save a gorilla-like half-breed, whose animal instinct of love
and fidelity fell about the poor boy like a protecting garment.
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