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    The Sea-Wolf by Jack London (Illustrated)
    The Sea-Wolf by Jack London (Illustrated)
    The Sea-Wolf by Jack London (Illustrated)
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    The Sea-Wolf by Jack London (Illustrated)

    By Jack London

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    This eBook features the unabridged text of ‘The Sea-Wolf’ from the bestselling edition of ‘The Complete Works of Jack London’.

    Having established their name as the leading publisher of classic literature and art, Delphi Classics produce publications that are individually crafted with superior formatting, while introducing many rare texts for the first time in digital print. The Delphi Classics edition of London includes original annotations and illustrations relating to the life and works of the author, as well as individual tables of contents, allowing you to navigate eBooks quickly and easily.

    eBook features:
    * The complete unabridged text of ‘The Sea-Wolf’
    * Beautifully illustrated with images related to London’s works
    * Individual contents table, allowing easy navigation around the eBook
    * Excellent formatting of the textPlease visit www.delphiclassics.com to learn more about our wide range of titles
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPublishdrive
    Release dateJul 17, 2017
    ISBN9781786561725
    The Sea-Wolf by Jack London (Illustrated)
    Author

    Jack London

    Jack London (January 12, 1876 November 22, 1916), was an American author who wrote The Call of the Wild and other books. A pioneer in the then-burgeoning world of commercial magazine fiction, he was one of the first Americans to make a huge financial success from writing."Speakin' in general, I 'ave tried 'em all,The 'appy roads that take you o'er the world.Speakin' in general, I 'ave found them goodFor such as cannot use one bed too long,But must get 'ence, the same as I 'ave done,An' go observin' matters till they die."Sestina of the Tramp-Royal

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      The Sea-Wolf by Jack London (Illustrated) - Jack London

      of

      JACK LONDON

      VOLUME 5 OF 57

      The Sea-Wolf

      Parts Edition

      By Delphi Classics, 2014

      Version 3

      COPYRIGHT

      ‘The Sea-Wolf’

      Jack London: Parts Edition (in 57 parts)

      First published in the United Kingdom in 2017 by Delphi Classics.

      © Delphi Classics, 2017.

      All rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form other than that in which it is published.

      ISBN: 978 1 78656 172 5

      Delphi Classics

      is an imprint of

      Delphi Publishing Ltd

      Hastings, East Sussex

      United Kingdom

      Contact: [email protected]

      www.delphiclassics.com

      Jack London: Parts Edition

      This eBook is Part 5 of the Delphi Classics edition of Jack London in 57 Parts. It features the unabridged text of The Sea-Wolf from the bestselling edition of the author’s Complete Works. Having established their name as the leading publisher of classic literature and art, Delphi Classics produce publications that are individually crafted with superior formatting, while introducing many rare texts for the first time in digital print. Our Parts Editions feature original annotations and illustrations relating to the life and works of Jack London, as well as individual tables of contents, allowing you to navigate eBooks quickly and easily.

      Visit here to buy the entire Parts Edition of Jack London or the Complete Works of Jack London in a single eBook.

      Learn more about our Parts Edition, with free downloads, via this link or browse our most popular Parts here.

      JACK LONDON

      IN 57 VOLUMES

      Parts Edition Contents

      The Novels

      1, The Cruise of the Dazzler

      2, A Daughter of the Snows

      3, The Call of the Wild

      4, The Kempton-Wace Letters

      5, The Sea-Wolf

      6, The Game

      7, White Fang

      8, Before Adam

      9, The Iron Heel

      10, Martin Eden

      11, Burning Daylight

      12, Adventure

      13, Smoke Bellew

      14, The Scarlet Plague

      15, A Son of the Sun

      16, The Abysmal Brute

      17, The Valley of the Moon

      18, The Mutiny of the Elsinore

      19, The Star Rover

      20, The Jacket

      21, The Little Lady of the Big House

      22, Jerry of the Islands

      23, Michael, Brother of Jerry

      24, Hearts of Three

      The Short Stories

      25, The Complete Short Stories

      The Plays

      26, Theft

      27, The Acorn-Planter

      28, A Wicked Woman

      29, The Birth Mark

      30, The First Poet

      31, The Return of Ulysses: A Modern Version

      The Poetry

      32, The Complete Poems

      The Memoirs

      33, The Road

      34, John Barleycorn

      The Non-Fiction

      35, The People of the Abyss

      36, War of the Classes

      37, How I Became a Socialist

      38, Revolution and Other Essays

      39, The Cruise of the Snark

      40, What Communities Lose by the Competitive System

      41, The Human Drift

      42, The Story of an Eyewitness

      43, Editorial Crimes – a Protest

      44, The Future of War

      45, Mexico’s Army and Ours

      46, A Letter to Houghton, Mifflin & Co.

      47, A Letter to Woman’s Home Companion

      48, Phenomena of Literary Evolution

      49, Again the Literary Aspirant

      50, The Red Game of War

      51, With Funston’s Men

      52, Stalking the Pestilence

      53, The Trouble Makers of Mexico

      54, Lawgivers

      55, Our Adventures in Tampico

      56, Housekeeping in the Klondike

      The Biography

      57, Book of Jack London by Charmian London

      www.delphiclassics.com

      The Sea-Wolf

      This 1904 psychological adventure novel features a literary critic as the protagonist.  He is the survivor of an ocean collision, who comes under the dominance of Wolf Larsen, the powerful and amoral sea captain that rescues him. Its first printing of forty thousand copies were immediately sold out before publication due to the success of the previous novel The Call of the Wild.

      The first edition

      CONTENTS

      CHAPTER I

      CHAPTER II

      CHAPTER III

      CHAPTER IV

      CHAPTER V

      CHAPTER VI

      CHAPTER VII

      CHAPTER VIII

      CHAPTER IX

      CHAPTER X

      CHAPTER XI

      CHAPTER XII

      CHAPTER XIII

      CHAPTER XIV

      CHAPTER XV

      CHAPTER XVI

      CHAPTER XVII

      CHAPTER XVIII

      CHAPTER XIX

      CHAPTER XX

      CHAPTER XXI

      CHAPTER XXII

      CHAPTER XXIII

      CHAPTER XXIV

      CHAPTER XXV

      CHAPTER XXVI

      CHAPTER XXVII

      CHAPTER XXVIII

      CHAPTER XXIX

      CHAPTER XXX

      CHAPTER XXXI

      CHAPTER XXXII

      CHAPTER XXXIIII

      CHAPTER XXXIV

      CHAPTER XXXV

      CHAPTER XXXVI

      CHAPTER XXXVII

      CHAPTER XXXVIII

      CHAPTER XXXIX

      CHAPTER I

      I scarcely know where to begin, though I sometimes facetiously place the cause of it all to Charley Furuseth’s credit.  He kept a summer cottage in Mill Valley, under the shadow of Mount Tamalpais, and never occupied it except when he loafed through the winter months and read Nietzsche and Schopenhauer to rest his brain.  When summer came on, he elected to sweat out a hot and dusty existence in the city and to toil incessantly.  Had it not been my custom to run up to see him every Saturday afternoon and to stop over till Monday morning, this particular January Monday morning would not have found me afloat on San Francisco Bay.

      Not but that I was afloat in a safe craft, for the Martinez was a new ferry-steamer, making her fourth or fifth trip on the run between Sausalito and San Francisco.  The danger lay in the heavy fog which blanketed the bay, and of which, as a landsman, I had little apprehension.  In fact, I remember the placid exaltation with which I took up my position on the forward upper deck, directly beneath the pilot-house, and allowed the mystery of the fog to lay hold of my imagination.  A fresh breeze was blowing, and for a time I was alone in the moist obscurity — yet not alone, for I was dimly conscious of the presence of the pilot, and of what I took to be the captain, in the glass house above my head.

      I remember thinking how comfortable it was, this division of labour which made it unnecessary for me to study fogs, winds, tides, and navigation, in order to visit my friend who lived across an arm of the sea.  It was good that men should be specialists, I mused.  The peculiar knowledge of the pilot and captain sufficed for many thousands of people who knew no more of the sea and navigation than I knew.  On the other hand, instead of having to devote my energy to the learning of a multitude of things, I concentrated it upon a few particular things, such as, for instance, the analysis of Poe’s place in American literature — an essay of mine, by the way, in the current Atlantic.  Coming aboard, as I passed through the cabin, I had noticed with greedy eyes a stout gentleman reading the Atlantic, which was open at my very essay.  And there it was again, the division of labour, the special knowledge of the pilot and captain which permitted the stout gentleman to read my special knowledge on Poe while they carried him safely from Sausalito to San Francisco.

      A red-faced man, slamming the cabin door behind him and stumping out on the deck, interrupted my reflections, though I made a mental note of the topic for use in a projected essay which I had thought of calling The Necessity for Freedom: A Plea for the Artist.  The red-faced man shot a glance up at the pilot-house, gazed around at the fog, stumped across the deck and back (he evidently had artificial legs), and stood still by my side, legs wide apart, and with an expression of keen enjoyment on his face.  I was not wrong when I decided that his days had been spent on the sea.

      It’s nasty weather like this here that turns heads grey before their time, he said, with a nod toward the pilot-house.

      I had not thought there was any particular strain, I answered.  It seems as simple as A, B, C.  They know the direction by compass, the distance, and the speed.  I should not call it anything more than mathematical certainty.

      Strain! he snorted.  Simple as A, B, C!  Mathematical certainty!

      He seemed to brace himself up and lean backward against the air as he stared at me.  How about this here tide that’s rushin’ out through the Golden Gate? he demanded, or bellowed, rather.  How fast is she ebbin’?  What’s the drift, eh?  Listen to that, will you?  A bell-buoy, and we’re a-top of it!  See ’em alterin’ the course!

      From out of the fog came the mournful tolling of a bell, and I could see the pilot turning the wheel with great rapidity.  The bell, which had seemed straight ahead, was now sounding from the side.  Our own whistle was blowing hoarsely, and from time to time the sound of other whistles came to us from out of the fog.

      That’s a ferry-boat of some sort, the new-comer said, indicating a whistle off to the right.  And there!  D’ye hear that?  Blown by mouth.  Some scow schooner, most likely.  Better watch out, Mr. Schooner-man.  Ah, I thought so.  Now hell’s a poppin’ for somebody!

      The unseen ferry-boat was blowing blast after blast, and the mouth-blown horn was tooting in terror-stricken fashion.

      And now they’re payin’ their respects to each other and tryin’ to get clear, the red-faced man went on, as the hurried whistling ceased.

      His face was shining, his eyes flashing with excitement as he translated into articulate language the speech of the horns and sirens.  That’s a steam-siren a-goin’ it over there to the left.  And you hear that fellow with a frog in his throat — a steam schooner as near as I can judge, crawlin’ in from the Heads against the tide.

      A shrill little whistle, piping as if gone mad, came from directly ahead and from very near at hand.  Gongs sounded on the Martinez.  Our paddle-wheels stopped, their pulsing beat died away, and then they started again.  The shrill little whistle, like the chirping of a cricket amid the cries of great beasts, shot through the fog from more to the side and swiftly grew faint and fainter.  I looked to my companion for enlightenment.

      One of them dare-devil launches, he said.  I almost wish we’d sunk him, the little rip!  They’re the cause of more trouble.  And what good are they?  Any jackass gets aboard one and runs it from hell to breakfast, blowin’ his whistle to beat the band and tellin’ the rest of the world to look out for him, because he’s comin’ and can’t look out for himself!  Because he’s comin’!  And you’ve got to look out, too!  Right of way!  Common decency!  They don’t know the meanin’ of it!

      I felt quite amused at his unwarranted choler, and while he stumped indignantly up and down I fell to dwelling upon the romance of the fog.  And romantic it certainly was — the fog, like the grey shadow of infinite mystery, brooding over the whirling speck of earth; and men, mere motes of light and sparkle, cursed with an insane relish for work, riding their steeds of wood and steel through the heart of the mystery, groping their way blindly through the Unseen, and clamouring and clanging in confident speech the while their hearts are heavy with incertitude and fear.

      The voice of my companion brought me back to myself with a laugh.  I too had been groping and floundering, the while I thought I rode clear-eyed through the mystery.

      Hello! somebody comin’ our way, he was saying.  And d’ye hear that?  He’s comin’ fast.  Walking right along.  Guess he don’t hear us yet.  Wind’s in wrong direction.

      The fresh breeze was blowing right down upon us, and I could hear the whistle plainly, off to one side and a little ahead.

      Ferry-boat? I asked.

      He nodded, then added, Or he wouldn’t be keepin’ up such a clip.  He gave a short chuckle.  They’re gettin’ anxious up there.

      I glanced up.  The captain had thrust his head and shoulders out of the pilot-house, and was staring intently into the fog as though by sheer force of will he could penetrate it.  His face was anxious, as was the face of my companion, who had stumped over to the rail and was gazing with a like intentness in the direction of the invisible danger.

      Then everything happened, and with inconceivable rapidity.  The fog seemed to break away as though split by a wedge, and the bow of a steamboat emerged, trailing fog-wreaths on either side like seaweed on the snout of Leviathan.  I could see the pilot-house and a white-bearded man leaning partly out of it, on his elbows.  He was clad in a blue uniform, and I remember noting how trim and quiet he was.  His quietness, under the circumstances, was terrible.  He accepted Destiny, marched hand in hand with it, and coolly measured the stroke.  As he leaned there, he ran a calm and speculative eye over us, as though to determine the precise point of the collision, and took no notice whatever when our pilot, white with rage, shouted, Now you’ve done it!

      On looking back, I realize that the remark was too obvious to make rejoinder necessary.

      Grab hold of something and hang on, the red-faced man said to me.  All his bluster had gone, and he seemed to have caught the contagion of preternatural calm.  And listen to the women scream, he said grimly — almost bitterly, I thought, as though he had been through the experience before.

      The vessels came together before I could follow his advice.  We must have been struck squarely amidships, for I saw nothing, the strange steamboat having passed beyond my line of vision.  The Martinez heeled over, sharply, and there was a crashing and rending of timber.  I was thrown flat on the wet deck, and before I could scramble to my feet I heard the scream of the women.  This it was, I am certain, — the most indescribable of blood-curdling sounds, — that threw me into a panic.  I remembered the life-preservers stored in the cabin, but was met at the door and swept backward by a wild rush of men and women.  What happened in the next few minutes I do not recollect, though I have a clear remembrance of pulling down life-preservers from the overhead racks, while the red-faced man fastened them about the bodies of an hysterical group of women.  This memory is as distinct and sharp as that of any picture I have seen.  It is a picture, and I can see it now, — the jagged edges of the hole in the side of the cabin, through which the grey fog swirled and eddied; the empty upholstered seats, littered with all the evidences of sudden flight, such as packages, hand satchels, umbrellas, and wraps; the stout gentleman who had been reading my essay, encased in cork and canvas, the magazine still in his hand, and asking me with monotonous insistence if I thought there was any danger; the red-faced man, stumping gallantly around on his artificial legs and buckling life-preservers on all comers; and finally, the screaming bedlam of women.

      This it was, the screaming of the women, that most tried my nerves.  It must have tried, too, the nerves of the red-faced man, for I have another picture which will never fade from my mind.  The stout gentleman is stuffing the magazine into his overcoat pocket and looking on curiously.  A tangled mass of women, with drawn, white faces and open mouths, is shrieking like a chorus of lost souls; and the red-faced man, his face now purplish with wrath, and with arms extended overhead as in the act of hurling thunderbolts, is shouting, Shut up!  Oh, shut up!

      I remember the scene impelled me to sudden laughter, and in the next instant I realized I was becoming hysterical myself; for these were women of my own kind, like my mother and sisters, with the fear of death upon them and unwilling to die.  And I remember that the sounds they made reminded me of the squealing of pigs under the knife of the butcher, and I was struck with horror at the vividness of the analogy.  These women, capable of the most sublime emotions, of the tenderest sympathies, were open-mouthed and screaming.  They wanted to live, they were helpless, like rats in a trap, and they screamed.

      The horror of it drove me out on deck.  I was feeling sick and squeamish, and sat down on a bench.  In a hazy way I saw and heard men rushing and shouting as they strove to lower the boats.  It was just as I had read descriptions of such scenes in books.  The tackles jammed.  Nothing worked.  One boat lowered away with the plugs out, filled with women and children and then with water, and capsized.  Another boat had been lowered by one end, and still hung in the tackle by the other end, where it had been abandoned.  Nothing was to be seen of the strange steamboat which had caused the disaster, though I heard men saying that she would undoubtedly send boats to our assistance.

      I descended to the lower deck.  The Martinez was sinking fast, for the water was very near.  Numbers of the passengers were leaping overboard.  Others, in the water, were clamouring to be taken aboard again.  No one heeded them.  A cry arose that we were sinking.  I was seized by the consequent panic, and went over the side in a surge of bodies.  How I went over I do not know, though I did know, and instantly, why those in the water were so desirous of getting back on the steamer.  The water was cold — so cold that it was painful.  The pang, as I plunged into it, was as quick and sharp as that of fire.  It bit to the marrow.  It was like the grip of death.  I gasped with the anguish and shock of it, filling my lungs before the life-preserver popped me to the surface.  The taste of the salt was strong in my mouth, and I was strangling with the acrid stuff in my throat and lungs.

      But it was the cold that was most distressing.  I felt that I could survive but a few minutes.  People were struggling and floundering in the water about me.  I could hear them crying out to one another.  And I heard, also, the sound of oars.  Evidently the strange steamboat had lowered its boats.  As the time went by I marvelled that I was still alive.  I had no sensation whatever in my lower limbs, while a chilling numbness was wrapping about my heart and creeping into it.  Small waves, with spiteful foaming crests, continually broke over me and into my mouth, sending me off into more strangling paroxysms.

      The noises grew indistinct, though I heard a final and despairing chorus of screams in the distance, and knew that the Martinez had gone down.  Later, — how much later I have no knowledge, — I came to myself with a start of fear.  I was alone.  I could hear no calls or cries — only the sound of the waves, made weirdly hollow and reverberant by the fog.  A panic in a crowd, which partakes of a sort of community of interest, is not so terrible as a panic when one is by oneself; and such a panic I now suffered.  Whither was I drifting?  The red-faced man had said that the tide was ebbing through the Golden Gate.  Was I, then, being carried out to sea?  And the life-preserver in which I floated?  Was it not liable to go to pieces at any moment?  I had heard of such things being made of paper and hollow rushes which quickly became saturated and lost all buoyancy.  And I could not swim a stroke.  And I was alone, floating, apparently, in the midst of a grey primordial vastness.  I confess that a madness seized me, that I shrieked aloud as the women had shrieked, and beat the water with my numb hands.

      How long this lasted I have no conception, for a blankness intervened, of which I remember no more than one remembers of troubled and painful sleep.  When I aroused, it was as after centuries of time; and I saw, almost above me and emerging from the fog, the bow of a vessel, and three triangular sails, each shrewdly lapping the other and filled with wind.  Where the bow cut the water there was a great foaming and gurgling, and I seemed directly in its path.  I tried to cry out, but was too exhausted.  The bow plunged down, just missing me and sending a swash of water clear over my head.  Then the long, black side of the vessel began slipping past, so near that I could have touched it with my hands.  I tried to reach it, in a mad resolve to claw into the wood with my nails, but my arms were heavy and lifeless.  Again I strove to call out, but made no sound.

      The stern of the vessel shot by, dropping, as it did so, into a hollow between the waves; and I caught a glimpse of a man standing at the wheel, and of another man who seemed to be doing little else than smoke a cigar.  I saw the smoke issuing from his lips as he slowly turned his head and glanced out over the water in my direction.  It was a careless, unpremeditated glance, one of those haphazard things men do when they have no immediate call to do anything in particular, but act because they are alive and must do something.

      But life and death were in that glance.  I could see the vessel being swallowed up in the fog; I saw the back of the man at the wheel, and the head of the other man turning, slowly turning, as his gaze struck the water and casually lifted along it toward me.  His face wore an absent expression, as of deep thought, and I became afraid that if his eyes did light upon me he would nevertheless not see me.  But his eyes did light upon me, and looked squarely into mine; and he did see me, for he sprang to the wheel, thrusting the other man aside, and whirled it round and round, hand over hand, at the same time shouting orders of some sort.  The vessel seemed to go off at a tangent to its former course and leapt almost instantly from view into the fog.

      I felt myself slipping into unconsciousness, and tried with all the power of my will to fight above the suffocating blankness and darkness that was rising around me.  A little later I heard the stroke of oars, growing nearer and nearer, and the calls of a man.  When he was very near I heard him crying, in vexed fashion, Why in hell don’t you sing out?  This meant me, I thought, and then the blankness and darkness rose over me.

      CHAPTER II

      I seemed swinging in a mighty rhythm through orbit vastness.  Sparkling points of light spluttered and shot past me.  They were stars, I knew, and flaring comets, that peopled my flight among the suns.  As I reached the limit of my swing and prepared to rush back on the counter swing, a great gong struck and thundered.  For an immeasurable period, lapped in the rippling of placid centuries, I enjoyed and pondered my tremendous flight.

      But a change came over the face of the dream, for a dream I told myself it must be.  My rhythm grew shorter and shorter.  I was jerked from swing to counter swing with irritating haste.  I could scarcely catch my breath, so fiercely was I impelled through the heavens.  The gong thundered more frequently and more furiously.  I grew to await it with a nameless dread.  Then it seemed as though I were being dragged over rasping sands, white and hot in the sun.  This gave place to a sense of intolerable anguish.  My skin was scorching in the torment of fire.  The gong clanged and knelled.  The sparkling points of light flashed past me in an interminable stream, as though the whole sidereal system were dropping into the void.  I gasped, caught my breath painfully, and opened my eyes.  Two men were kneeling beside me, working over me.  My mighty rhythm was the lift and forward plunge of a ship on the sea.  The terrific gong was a frying-pan, hanging on the wall, that rattled and clattered with each leap of the ship.  The rasping, scorching sands were a man’s hard hands chafing my naked chest.  I squirmed under the pain of it, and half lifted my head.  My chest was raw and red, and I could see tiny blood globules starting through the torn and inflamed cuticle.

      That’ll do, Yonson, one of the men said.  Carn’t yer see you’ve bloomin’ well rubbed all the gent’s skin orf?

      The man addressed as Yonson, a man of the heavy Scandinavian type, ceased chafing me, and arose awkwardly to his feet.  The man who had spoken to him was clearly a Cockney, with the clean lines and weakly pretty, almost effeminate, face of the man who has absorbed the sound of Bow Bells with his mother’s milk.  A draggled muslin cap on his head and a dirty gunny-sack about his slim hips proclaimed him cook of the decidedly dirty ship’s galley in which I found myself.

      An’ ’ow yer feelin’ now, sir? he asked, with the subservient smirk which comes only of generations of tip-seeking ancestors.

      For reply, I twisted weakly into a sitting posture, and was helped by Yonson to my feet.  The rattle and bang of the frying-pan was grating horribly on my nerves.  I could not collect my thoughts.  Clutching the woodwork of the galley for support, — and I confess the grease with which it was scummed put my teeth on edge, — I reached across a hot cooking-range to the offending utensil, unhooked it, and wedged it securely into the coal-box.

      The cook grinned at my exhibition of nerves, and thrust into my hand a steaming mug with an ’Ere, this’ll do yer good.  It was a nauseous mess, — ship’s coffee, — but the heat of it was revivifying.  Between gulps of the molten stuff I glanced down at my raw and bleeding chest and turned to the Scandinavian.

      Thank you, Mr. Yonson, I said; but don’t you think your measures were rather heroic?

      It was because he understood the reproof of my action, rather than of my words, that he held up his palm for inspection.  It was remarkably calloused.  I passed my hand over the horny projections, and my teeth went on edge once more from the horrible rasping sensation produced.

      My name is Johnson, not Yonson, he said, in very good, though slow, English, with no more than a shade of accent to it.

      There was mild protest in his pale blue eyes, and withal a timid frankness and manliness that quite won me to him.

      Thank you, Mr. Johnson, I corrected, and reached out my hand for his.

      He hesitated, awkward and bashful, shifted his weight from one leg to the other, then blunderingly gripped my hand in a hearty shake.

      Have you any dry clothes I may put on? I asked the cook.

      Yes, sir, he answered, with cheerful alacrity.  I’ll run down an’ tyke a look over my kit, if you’ve no objections, sir, to wearin’ my things.

      He dived out of the galley door, or glided rather, with a swiftness and smoothness of gait that struck me as being not so much cat-like as oily.  In fact, this oiliness, or greasiness, as I was later to learn, was probably the most salient expression of his personality.

      And where am I? I asked Johnson, whom I took, and rightly, to be one of the sailors.  What vessel is this, and where is she bound?

      Off the Farallones, heading about sou-west, he answered, slowly and methodically, as though groping for his best English, and rigidly observing the order of my queries.  "The schooner Ghost, bound seal-hunting to Japan."

      And who is the captain?  I must see him as soon as I am dressed.

      Johnson looked puzzled and embarrassed.  He hesitated while he groped in his vocabulary and framed a complete answer.  The cap’n is Wolf Larsen, or so men call him.  I never heard his other name.  But you better speak soft with him.  He is mad this morning.  The mate —

      But he did not finish.  The cook had glided in.

      Better sling yer ’ook out of ’ere, Yonson, he said.  The old man’ll be wantin’ yer on deck, an’ this ayn’t no d’y to fall foul of ’im.

      Johnson turned obediently to the door, at the same time, over the cook’s shoulder, favouring me with an amazingly solemn and portentous wink as though to emphasize his interrupted remark and the need for me to be soft-spoken with the captain.

      Hanging over the cook’s arm was a loose and crumpled array of evil-looking and sour-smelling garments.

      They was put aw’y wet, sir, he vouchsafed explanation.  But you’ll ’ave to make them do till I dry yours out by the fire.

      Clinging to the woodwork, staggering with the roll of the ship, and aided by the cook, I managed to slip into a rough woollen undershirt.  On the instant my flesh was creeping and crawling from the harsh contact.  He noticed my involuntary twitching and grimacing, and smirked:

      I only ’ope yer don’t ever ’ave to get used to such as that in this life, ’cos you’ve got a bloomin’ soft skin, that you ’ave, more like a lydy’s than any I know of.  I was bloomin’ well sure you was a gentleman as soon as I set eyes on yer.

      I had taken a dislike to him at first, and as he helped to dress me this dislike increased.  There was something repulsive about his touch.  I shrank from his hand; my flesh revolted.  And between this and the smells arising from various pots boiling and bubbling on the galley fire, I was in haste to get out into the fresh air.  Further, there was the need of seeing the captain about what arrangements could be made for getting me ashore.

      A cheap cotton shirt, with frayed collar and a bosom discoloured with what I took to be ancient blood-stains, was put on me amid a running and apologetic fire of comment.  A pair of workman’s brogans encased my feet, and for trousers I was furnished with a pair of pale blue, washed-out overalls, one leg of which was fully ten inches shorter than the other.  The abbreviated leg looked as though the devil had there clutched for the Cockney’s soul and missed the shadow for the substance.

      And whom have I to thank for this kindness? I asked, when I stood completely arrayed, a tiny boy’s cap on my head, and for coat a dirty, striped cotton jacket which ended at the small of my back and the sleeves of which reached just below my elbows.

      The cook drew himself up in a smugly humble fashion, a deprecating smirk on his face.  Out of my experience with stewards on the Atlantic liners at the end of the voyage, I could have sworn he was waiting for his tip.  From my fuller knowledge of the creature I now know that the posture was unconscious.  An hereditary servility, no doubt, was responsible.

      Mugridge, sir, he fawned, his effeminate features running into a greasy smile.  Thomas Mugridge, sir, an’ at yer service.

      All right, Thomas, I said.  I shall not forget you — when my clothes are dry.

      A soft light suffused his face and his eyes glistened, as though somewhere in the deeps of his being his ancestors had quickened and stirred with dim memories of tips received in former lives.

      Thank you, sir, he said, very gratefully and very humbly indeed.

      Precisely in the way that the door slid back, he slid aside, and I stepped out on deck.  I was still weak from my prolonged immersion.  A puff of wind caught me, — and I staggered across the moving deck to a corner of the cabin, to

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