196 



THE RAT 



timbers, we plunged upon our doom. The whole 

 ship staggered and shivered like a creature which 

 has just received a mortal wound. 



' I wonder whether Nature is merciful to ships, 

 even as she is to the rest of her children in their 

 hour of sorrow ; whether she sends to them also 

 that blessed relief of numbing torpor which 

 prevents us from realizing the agony of our pain. 

 I think myself that she must do so, for just as a 

 creature which has received a mortal hurt crawls 

 away to some quiet place in order that no eye may 

 witness the drooping head, and the failing limbs, and 

 the light fading out of the eye, and the fur, once so 

 carefully tended, but now bedraggled with the 

 sweat of death, so did our stricken ship, as the 

 backward wash of the water released her from the 

 cruel fangs, stagger away blindly round a towering 

 headland and into a quiet bay, where the storm 

 passed roaring overhead, and left the waters com- 

 paratively unvexed. 



'There she settled herself down to die quietly, 

 and no efforts of ours could save her. Higher and 

 higher rose the water in the hold, as it poured 

 in through a great rent in her wounded bows, and 

 a terrified stream of rats came rushing up on deck. 

 They were leaving the sinking ship now with a 



