“Sharks,” said Lestrange, whose face was covered with perspiration. 

 He picked up the book he had been reading—it was a volume of Tennyson—and he sat with it on his knees staring at the white sunlit main-deck barred with the white shadows of the standing rigging. 

 The sea had disclosed to him a vision. Poetry, Philosophy, Beauty, Art, the love and joy of life—was it possible that these should exist in the same world as those? 

 He glanced at the book upon his knees, and contrasted the beautiful things in it which he remembered with the terrible things he had just seen, the things that were waiting for their food under the keel of the ship. 

 It was three bells—half-past three in the afternoon—and the ship’s bell had just rung out. The stewardess appeared to take the children below; and as they vanished down the saloon companion-way Captain Le Farge came aft, on to the poop, and stood for a moment looking over the sea on the port side, where a bank of fog had suddenly appeared like the spectre of a country. 

 “The sun has dimmed a bit,” said he; “I can a’most look at it. Glass steady enough—there’s a fog coming up—ever seen a Pacific fog?” 

 “No, never.” 

 “Well, you won’t want to see another,” replied the mariner, shading his eyes and fixing them upon the sea-line. The sea-line away to starboard had lost somewhat its distinctness, and over the day an almost imperceptible shade had crept. 

 The captain suddenly turned from his contemplation of the sea and sky, raised his head and sniffed. 

 “Something is burning somewhere—smell it? Seems to me like an old mat or summat. It’s that swab of a steward, maybe; if he isn’t breaking glass, he’s upsetting lamps and burning holes in the carpet. Bless my soul, I’d sooner have a dozen Mary Anns an’ their dustpans round the place than one tomfool steward like Jenkins.” He went to the saloon hatch. “Below there!” 

 “Ay, ay, sir.” 

 “What are you burning?” 

 “I an’t burnin’ northen, sir.” 

 “Tell you, I smell it!” 

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