Exuberant Youth 1 9 



stars peeped out from the purple curtain of the night. 

 No ripple of wave or querulous wail of wind disturbed 

 the mid-sea quiet. Even the deep sigh of a waking 

 whale but punctuated the soft stillness of the restful 

 scene. All Nature was at ease around us, and above 

 as below there was perfect peace. 



The foregoing was just a typical evening as I 

 remember it during my babyhood. But one morning 

 there was communicated to all the family by that 

 subtle interchange of thought, independent of speech, 

 which we possess, the chief's order to proceed north- 

 ward, following him. No one so much as thought 

 of questioning his authority. He was our law and 

 its only exponent. As well have questioned our 

 ability to obey as his right to command. So as the 

 great sun flooded the horizon with golden flame as if 

 overflowing, we formed into ranks, and at a uniform 

 speed of about six miles an hour, departed from that 

 spot of ocean where I first knew life. I had no senti- 

 mental regrets, the whole wide sea was my home. 

 Nay, more ; I felt an absorbing desire to know more 

 of this apparently illimitable realm of waters which 

 had given me a place of birth in one of its tiniest eddies. 

 So I gambolled gaily along in the wake of the young 

 bulls of the school, restraining with difficulty my 

 desire to leap after the manner of the chief, and 

 revelling in the cool depths to which we periodically 

 descended in search of food. When I come to think 

 of it with the calmness that befits my age, I feel 

 impelled to assert that in those days I had but two 

 overmastering desires, the desire to eat, and the desire 

 to dissipate the abundant strength that my eating 

 gave me. But withal, I knew how to obey, or rather 

 shall I say, I knew not how to disobey the guidance 

 of my leader. Like all young things I felt independent 



