Then one day there is an unusual stir of activity on deck. The sailors are stripping the canvas from off the lifeboats. The great crane is hauling the life rafts from out the hold. Oh, what is going to happen? The most nervous passenger wants right away to know. And the truthful answer to her query is, that no one can tell. But we are making ready now for shipwreck. In these days, methodically, like this it is done. It has to be, as you approach the more intense danger zone of a mined coast. You see you never can tell.
I go inside once more to try the straps of my life preserver. But we are sailing through a sunlit sea. And at dinner the philosopher at our table—he is a Hindu from Calcutta—says smilingly, "Now this will do very nicely for shipwreck weather, gentlemen, very nicely for shipwreck weather." It is the round-faced Hollander at my right, of orthodox Presbyterian faith, who protests earnestly, "Ah, but please no. Do not jest." The next day when the dishes slide back and forth between the table racks, none of us laugh when the Hollander says solemnly, "See, but if God should call us now." Ah, if he should, our life boats would never last us to Heaven. They would crumple like floats of paper in Neptune's hand. Eating our dessert, we look out on the terrible green and white sea that licks and slaps at the portholes and all of us are very still. The lace importer from New York at my left, is the most quiet of all.
For eight days and nights we have escaped all
