The air was hot, but it
struck a chill from its foetor.
From all round in the dark bunks, the scarcely human noises of the
sick joined into a kind of farmyard chorus. In the midst, these five
friends of mine were keeping up what heart they could in company.
Singing was their refuge from discomfortable thoughts and sensations.
One piped, in feeble tones, 'Oh why left I my hame?' which seemed a
pertinent question in the circumstances. Another, from the invisible
horrors of a pen where he lay dog-sick upon the upper-shelf, found
courage, in a blink of his sufferings, to give us several verses of
the 'Death of Nelson'; and it was odd and eerie to hear the chorus
breathe feebly from all sorts of dark corners, and 'this day has done
his dooty' rise and fall and be taken up again in this dim inferno,
to an accompaniment of plunging, hollow-sounding bows and the
rattling spray-showers overhead.
All seemed unfit for conversation; a certain dizziness had
interrupted the activity of their minds; and except to sing they were
tongue-tied. There was present, however, one tall, powerful fellow
of doubtful nationality, being neither quite Scotsman nor altogether
Irish, but of surprising clearness of conviction on the highest
problems.
Pages:
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52