," he answered. "The Horn's the
Horn, and there's no summer seas that I've ever noticed in this
neighbourhood."

My fingers were numb and I was chilled through when I took a last look at
the wretched men on the fore-yard and went below to warm up.

A little later, as I went in to table, through a cabin port I stole a
look for'ard between seas and saw the men still struggling on the
freezing yard.

The four of us were at table, and it was very comfortable, in spite of
the _Elsinore's_ violent antics. The room was warm. The storm-racks on
the table kept each dish in its place. The steward served and moved
about with ease and apparent unconcern, although I noticed an occasional
anxious gleam in his eyes when he poised some dish at a moment when the
ship pitched and flung with unusual wildness.

And now and again I thought of the poor devils on the yard. Well, they
belonged there by right, just as we belonged here by right in this oasis
of the cabin. I looked at Mr. Pike and wagered to myself that half-a-
dozen like him could master that stubborn foresail. As for the Samurai,
I was convinced that alone, not moving from his seat, by a tranquil
exertion of will, he could accomplish the same thing.

The lighted sea-lamps swung and leaped in their gimbals, ever battling
with the dancing shadows in the murky gray. The wood-work creaked and
groaned. The jiggermast, a huge cylinder of hollow steel that perforated
the apartment through deck above and floor beneath, was hideously vocal
with the storm. Far above, taut ropes beat against it so that it clanged
like a boiler-shop. There was a perpetual thunder of seas falling on our
deck and crash of water against our for'ard wall; while the ten thousand
ropes and gears aloft bellowed and screamed as the storm smote them.

And yet all this was from without. Here, at this well-appointed table,
was no draught nor breath of wind, no drive of spray nor wash of sea. We
were in the heart of peace in the midmost centre of the storm. Margaret
was in high spirits, and her laughter vied with the clang of the
jiggermast. Mr. Pike was gloomy, but I knew him well enough to attribute
his gloom, not to the elements, but to the inefficients futilely freezing
on the yard. As for me, I looked about at the four of us--blue-eyed,
gray-eyed, all fair-skinned and royal blond--and somehow it seemed that I
had long since lived this, and that with me and in me were all my
ancestors, and th