12 JUNGLE PEACE 



bizarre activities when he accords permission to 

 climb the swaying ratlines and heave yourself 

 into that wonderful place. It is tame enough 

 when compared with piloting a plane among the 

 clouds, but it presents an enormous expanse of 

 ocean compared with the humble deck view. 

 Here you can follow the small whales or black- 

 fish down and down long after they have 

 sounded ; with your binoculars you can see every 

 detail of the great floating turtles. And when 

 the sun sinks in glory which is terrible in its 

 grandeur, you may let it fill your senses with 

 wordless ecstasy, without fear of interpretive 

 interruption. Save for the other matchstick 

 mast and the spider-web ratlines, the horizon 

 is unbroken. 



Many years ago I spent a night in the torch 

 of the Statue of Liberty and each time I dozed, 

 the twenty odd inch arch through which the 

 lofty structure swayed, awoke me again and 

 again, being changed, behind one's closed lids, 

 into a single motion, apparently that of a 

 gradually accelerated fall to earth. In the 

 crow's nest, when the ship is rolling, I can 

 often conjure up the same feeling when my eyes 

 are shut, but now I react to a new stimulus 



