to Providence that I call the drunken skipper, though he drank
nothing but the waters of the River Jordan.

ELLIE. Splendid! And you haven't had a drop for an hour. You see you
don't need it: your own spirit is not dead.

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Echoes: nothing but echoes. The last shot was fired
years ago.

HECTOR. And this ship that we are all in? This soul's prison we call
England?

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. The captain is in his bunk, drinking bottled
ditch-water; and the crew is gambling in the forecastle. She will strike
and sink and split. Do you think the laws of God will be suspended in
favor of England because you were born in it?

HECTOR. Well, I don't mean to be drowned like a rat in a trap. I still
have the will to live. What am I to do?

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Do? Nothing simpler. Learn your business as an
Englishman.

HECTOR. And what may my business as an Englishman be, pray?

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Navigation. Learn it and live; or leave it and be
damned.

ELLIE. Quiet, quiet: you'll tire yourself.

MAZZINI. I thought all that once, Captain; but I assure you nothing will
happen.

A dull distant explosion is heard.

HECTOR [starting up]. What was that?

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Something happening [he blows his whistle]. Breakers
ahead!

The light goes out.

HECTOR [furiously]. Who put that light out? Who dared put that light
out?

NURSE GUINNESS [running in from the house to the middle of the
esplanade]. I did, sir. The police have telephoned to say we'll be
summoned if we don't put that light out: it can be seen for miles.

HECTOR. It shall be seen for a hundred miles [he dashes into the house].

NURSE GUINNESS. The Rectory is nothing but a heap of bricks, they say.
Unless we can give the Rector a bed he has nowhere to lay his head this
night.

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. The Church is on the rocks, breaking up. I told him it
would unless it headed for God's open sea.

NURSE GUINNESS. And you are all to go down to the cellars.

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Go there yourself, you and all the crew. Batten down
the hatches.

NURSE GUINNESS. And hide beside the coward I married! I'll go on the
roof first. [The lamp lights up again]. There! Mr Hushabye's turned it
on again.

THE BURGLAR [hurrying in and appealing to Nurse Guinness]. Here: where's
the way to that gravel pit? The boot-boy says there's a cave in the
gravel pit. Them cellars is no use. Where's the gravel pit, Captain?

NURSE GUINNESS. Go straight on past the fla