IT will be recollected that the destination of the Boston, when she sailed from Astoria on the 4th of August in 1812, was to proceed
northwardly along the coast to Sheetka, or New Archangel, there to dispose of that part of her cargo intended for the supply of the Russian establishment at that place, and then to return to Astoria, where it was expected she would arrive in October.
Combined with the Medjuck nexus factors such as navigational charts and other indicia of a
northwardly course towards the United States, there is sufficient evidence to detain, and subsequently arrest the crew for the attempted operation of an unmanned, unflagged submersible.
The narrator disagrees, however, insisting that the shapes form words translatable as "to be shady," "left or most
northwardly," and "to be white." To this racial and regional semaphore, the author Poe appends an unattributed sentence that sounds like God but might make more sense as coming from his servant Nat Turner: "I have graven it within the hills, and my vengeance upon the dust within the rock." (31)