ater ascendency over the crew of the raft,--by
means of which he had been enabled to appropriate to himself a larger
share of the food sparsely distributed amongst them. His ample covering
of hair may have had something to do with this appearance,--concealing
as it did the unevenness of the surface upon which it grew, and
imparting a plumper aspect to his face and features.

If there was a superiority in the quantity of flesh still clinging to
his bones, its quality might be questioned,--at all events, in regard to
the use that might soon be made of it. In point of tenderness, his
muscular integuments could scarcely compare with those of the Irishman,
whose bright skin promised--

These are horrid thoughts. They should not be her repeated, were it not
to show in its true light the terrible extremes, both of thought and
action, to which men may be reduced by starvation. Horrid as they may
appear, they were entertained at that crisis by the castaway crew of the
_Pandora_!

CHAPTER SIXTY NINE.

A CHALLENGE DECLINED.

When it came to the last drawing,--for there needed to be only one
more,--there was a pause in the proceedings, such as usually precedes an
expected climax.

It was accompanied by silence; so profound that, but for the noise made
by the waves as they dashed against the hollow hogsheads, a pin might
have been heard if dropped upon the planking of the raft. In the sound
of the sea there was something lugubrious: a fit accompaniment of the
unhallowed scene that was being enacted by those within hearing of it.
One might have fancied that spirits in fearful pain were confined within
the empty casks, and that the sounds that seemed to issue out of them
were groans elicited by their agony.

The two men, one of whom was doomed to die, stood face to face; the
others forming a sort of circle around them. All eyes were bent upon
them, while theirs were fixed only upon each other. The reciprocated
glance was one of dire hostility and hate,--combined with a hope on the
part of each to see the other dead, and then to survive him.

Both were inspired by a belief--in the presence of such an unexpected
contingency it was not unreasonable--that Fate had singled them out from
their fellows to stand in that strange antagonism. They were, in fact,
convinced of it.

Under the influence of this conviction, it might be supposed that
neither would offer any further opposition to Fate's decree, but would
yield t