me away and out of myself till I was no longer Hump the cabin-boy, nor
Van Weyden, the man who had dreamed away thirty-five years among books.
But a voice behind me, the unmistakable voice of Wolf Larsen, strong with
the invincible certitude of the man and mellow with appreciation of the
words he was quoting, aroused me.

"'O the blazing tropic night, when the wake's a welt of light
That holds the hot sky tame,
And the steady forefoot snores through the planet-powdered floors
Where the scared whale flukes in flame.
Her plates are scarred by the sun, dear lass,
And her ropes are taut with the dew,
For we're booming down on the old trail, our own trail, the out trail,
We're sagging south on the Long Trail--the trail that is always
new.'"

"Eh, Hump? How's it strike you?" he asked, after the due pause which
words and setting demanded.

I looked into his face. It was aglow with light, as the sea itself, and
the eyes were flashing in the starshine.

"It strikes me as remarkable, to say the least, that you should show
enthusiasm," I answered coldly.

"Why, man, it's living! it's life!" he cried.

"Which is a cheap thing and without value." I flung his words at him.

He laughed, and it was the first time I had heard honest mirth in his
voice.

"Ah, I cannot get you to understand, cannot drive it into your head, what
a thing this life is. Of course life is valueless, except to itself.
And I can tell you that my life is pretty valuable just now--to myself.
It is beyond price, which you will acknowledge is a terrific overrating,
but which I cannot help, for it is the life that is in me that makes the
rating."

He appeared waiting for the words with which to express the thought that
was in him, and finally went on.

"Do you know, I am filled with a strange uplift; I feel as if all time
were echoing through me, as though all powers were mine. I know truth,
divine good from evil, right from wrong. My vision is clear and far. I
could almost believe in God. But," and his voice changed and the light
went out of his face,--"what is this condition in which I find myself?
this joy of living? this exultation of life? this inspiration, I may well
call it? It is what comes when there is nothing wrong with one's
digestion, when his stomach is in trim and his appetite has an edge, and
all goes well. It is the bribe for living, the champagne of the blood,
the effervescence of the