t struggle of a nothing against
all; that Iliad against one.

Gilliatt gazed wildly into space.

He had no clothing. He stood naked in the midst of that immensity.

Then overwhelmed by the sense of that unknown infinity, like one
bewildered by a strange persecution, confronting the shadows of night,
in the presence of that impenetrable darkness, in the midst of the
murmur of the waves, the swell, the foam, the breeze, under the clouds,
under that vast diffusion of force, under that mysterious firmament of
wings, of stars, of gulfs, having around him and beneath him the ocean,
above him the constellations, under the great unfathomable deep, he
sank, gave up the struggle, lay down upon the rock, his face towards the
stars, humbled, and uplifting his joined hands towards the terrible
depths, he cried aloud, "Have mercy."

Weighed down to earth by that immensity, he prayed.

He was there alone, in the darkness upon the rock, in the midst of that
sea, stricken down with exhaustion like one smitten by lightning, naked
like the gladiator in the circus, save that for circus he had the vast
horizon, instead of wild beasts the shadows of darkness, instead of the
faces of the crowd the eyes of the Unknown, instead of the Vestals the
stars, instead of Caesar the All-powerful.

His whole being seemed to dissolve in cold, fatigue, powerlessness,
prayer, and darkness, and his eyes closed.

VII

THE APPEAL IS HEARD

Some hours passed.

The sun rose in an unclouded sky.

Its first ray shone upon a motionless form upon the Great Douvre. It was
Gilliatt.

He was still outstretched upon the rock.

He was naked, cold, and stiff; but he did not shiver. His closed eyelids
were wan. It would have been difficult for a beholder to say whether the
form before him was not a corpse.

The sun seemed to look upon him.

If he were not dead, he was already so near death that the slightest
cold wind would have sufficed to extinguish life.

The wind began to breathe, warm and animating: it was the opening breath
of May.

Meanwhile the sun ascended in the deep blue sky; its rays, less
horizontal, flushed the sky. Its light became warmth. It enveloped the
slumbering form.

Gilliatt moved not. If he breathed, it was only that feeble respiration
which could scarcely tarnish the surface of a mirror.

The sun continued its ascent; its rays striking less and less obliquely
upon the naked man. The gentle breeze which had been me