THE WEB OF ISLAND LIFE 201 



ering at the ends. The bestial action was heightened by the 

 sardonic, never-changing face of the crab with its bulbous 

 stalked eyes which appeared to regard the proceeding with 

 diabolical calm. The seemingly quiet world of the mangrove 

 roots was a place of deceit; life there was merciless; to relax for 

 a moment was to court sudden and painful death. Everywhere 

 existence was the same: the animals of the pool near my hut 

 spent their lives pitting their talents and forces against the ele- 

 ments and against a horde of hungry carnivores; the owl lived 

 because a lizard and a scorpion relaxed once too often and too 

 well. 



Struggle, bitter, unrelenting, never-ceasing strife is the por- 

 tion of all earth's creatures. Conflict is as much a part of heritage 

 as is form and instinct. Those creatures that do not go forward 

 fall back; the weak are eliminated, only the strong survive; the 

 defenseless must develop swiftness, the slow acquire armor, 

 spines like the sea urchins or other means of resistance. There 

 is no mercy for the swift that do not run, nor for the slow 

 that do not use their protection— nor for men that do not cul- 

 tivate their brains, the only weapon nature has given them. 

 Crabs or lizards, men or nations are all actuated by the same 

 basic principles: the Panopeus was dismembered because it 

 failed to watch; likewise the civilization of Ancient Rome 

 crumbled for much the same reason, the three hundred year 

 peace that followed the Augustan Age brought with it security 

 and ease— and carelessness and disintegration. The cruelty of 

 crab to crab and man to man can probably be matched incident 

 for incident. I have a very vivid recollection of a day in the 

 small town of Samana in the Dominican Republic when on the 

 orders of a high official a prisoner was forced by the police to 

 lay his hands on the stump of a tree, and bayonets were driven 

 through them and twisted in order to secure information in 

 regard to a thievery. I also recall the finding of a man's mutilated 



