shut. They scarcely cast a glance at their fallen
comrade, and that only when they stopped to gulp a glass of beer or
water.

"It was hardly three minutes ago," said Doctor Wilhelm, "that he broke
down. That man over there, the one who has just washed himself, is his
successor."

"He was just about to throw coal into the furnace," explained the
engineer who had called for Frederick, shouting at the top of his voice
to make himself heard above the clanging of the shovels and the banging
of the iron doors, "when his shovel flew out of his hand about twelve
feet away and almost struck a coal-trimmer. He was hired in Hamburg. The
moment he set foot on board, I thought, 'If only you pull through, my
boy.' He joked about himself. He said, 'If my heart is good.' I was sorry
for him. He wanted to cross the great pond, and that was his only way of
getting over. He wanted, no matter how, to see his brother again, his
only living relative, or somebody else. They hadn't seen each other for
fourteen years."

"_Exitus_," said Frederick, after a prolonged investigation of the man's
heart. Even a few moments after the stethoscope had been removed, one
could see the ring it made on his bluish, waxen skin. His chin dropped.
They put it back in place, and Frederick bound his jaws with his white
handkerchief. "He had a bad fall," Frederick remarked. It may actually
have been the unfortunate fall to which the helot owed his death. There
was a deep bleeding gash in his temple from the edge of a large nut.
"Probably a heart stroke," Frederick added, "the result of the heat and
over-exertion." He looked at the dead man, then at his mates, naked,
blackened, illuminated by the jaws of the glowing furnaces, and thought
of the fifth commandment, "Thou shalt not kill." If we were to take the
commandment literally, how far should we get?

The physicians mounted on deck, and several of the men picked up the
victim of civilisation, the modern galley-slave, still covered with the
sweat of his fearful occupation. With the handkerchief about his head, he
looked as if he were suffering from toothache. They carried him up out of
the glowing pit to the cabin set aside for dead bodies.

Doctor Wilhelm had to notify the captain. Nobody on deck, where the band
was playing the last measures, was to suspect that a stoker had died.
With the help of the Red Cross sister, they stretched him on a mattress,
and within a short time a circle of the higher officia