He turned to the mate.
"Mr. Pike, will you please go for'ard and interview this devil?
Fasten him up and tie him down and I'll take a look at him in the
morning."
"Yes, sir," said Mr. Pike; and Kipling's line came to me:
"Woman, Man, or God or Devil, was there anything we feared?"
And as I went for'ard through the wall of darkness after Mr. Pike and
Mr. Mellaire along the freezing, slender, sea-swept bridge--not a
sailor dared to accompany us--other lines of "The Galley Slave"
drifted through my brain, such as:
"Our bulkheads bulged with cotton and our masts were stepped in gold
-
We ran a mighty merchandise of niggers in the hold. . . "
And:
"By the brand upon my shoulder, by the gall of clinging steel,
By the welts the whips have left me, by the scars that never heal . .
. "
And:
"Battered chain-gangs of the orlop, grizzled draughts of years gone
by . . . "
And I caught my great, radiant vision of Mr. Pike, galley slave of
the race, and a driver of men under men greater than he; the faithful
henchman, the able sailorman, battered and grizzled, branded and
galled, the servant of the sweep-head that made mastery of the sea.
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