d'ye think we are?" Donkin rose and watched Belfast's back lurch through
the doorway. On all sides invisible men slept, breathing calmly. He
seemed to draw courage and fury from the peace around him. Venomous and
thin-faced, he glared from the ample misfit of borrowed clothes as if
looking for something he could smash. His heart leaped wildly in his
narrow chest. They slept! He wanted to wring necks, gouge eyes, spit
on faces. He shook a dirty pair of meagre fists at the smoking lights.
"Ye're no men!" he cried, in a deadened tone. No one moved. "Yer 'aven't
the pluck of a mouse!" His voice rose to a husky screech. Wamibo darted
out a dishevelled head, and looked at him wildly. "Ye're sweepings
ov ships! I 'ope you will all rot before you die!" Wamibo blinked,
uncomprehending but interested. Donkin sat down heavily; he blew with
force through quivering nostrils, he ground and snapped his teeth, and,
with the chin pressed hard against the breast, he seemed busy gnawing
his way through it, as if to get at the heart within....

In the morning the ship, beginning another day of her wandering life,
had an aspect of sumptuous freshness, like the spring-time of the earth.
The washed decks glistened in a long clear stretch; the oblique sunlight
struck the yellow brasses in dazzling splashes, darted over the polished
rods in lines of gold, and the single drops of salt water forgotten here
and there along the rail were as limpid as drops of dew, and sparkled
more than scattered diamonds. The sails slept, hushed by a gentle
breeze. The sun, rising lonely and splendid in the blue sky, saw a
solitary ship gliding close-hauled on the blue sea.

The men pressed three deep abreast of the mainmast and opposite the
cabin-door. They shuffled, pushed, had an irresolute mien and stolid
faces. At every slight movement Knowles lurched heavily on his short
leg. Donkin glided behind backs, restless and anxious, like a man
looking for an ambush. Captain Allistoun came out on the quarter-deck
suddenly. He walked to and fro before the front. He was grey, slight,
alert, shabby in the sunshine, and as hard as adamant. He had his right
hand in the side-pocket of his jacket, and also something heavy in there
that made folds all down that side. One of the seamen cleared his throat
ominously.--"I haven't till now found fault with you men," said the
master, stopping short. He faced them with his worn, steely gaze, that
by a universal illusion looked str