She is asleep.  Is she in a swoon?  No.  Her pulse is pretty strong.  She is only asleep.  Sleep is a reprieve.  It is the happy blindness.  What can I do to prevent people walking about here?  Gentlemen, if there be anybody on deck, I beg of you to make no noise.  Do not come near us, if you do not mind.  You know a person in delicate health requires a little attention.  She is feverish, you see.  She is very young.  ’Tis a little creature who is rather feverish.  I put this mattress down here so that she may have a little air.  I explain all this so that you should be careful.  She fell down exhausted on the mattress as if she had fainted.  But she is asleep.  I do hope that no one will awake her.  I address myself to the ladies, if there are any present.  A young girl, it is pitiful!  We are only poor mountebanks, but I beg a little kindness, and if there is anything to pay for not making a noise, I will pay it.  I thank you, ladies and gentlemen.  Is there any one there?  No?  I don’t think there is.  My talk is mere loss of breath.  So much the better.  Gentlemen, I thank you, if you are there; and I thank you still more if you are not.  Her forehead is all in perspiration.  Come, let us take our places in the galleys again.  Put on the chain.  Misery is come back.  We are sinking again.  A hand, the fearful hand which we cannot see, but the weight of which we feel ever upon us, has suddenly struck us back towards the dark point of our destiny.  Be it so.  We will bear up.  Only I will not have her ill.  I must seem a fool to talk aloud like this, when I am alone; but she must feel she has some one near her when she awakes.  What shall I do if somebody awakes her suddenly!  No noise, in the name of Heaven!  A sudden shock which would awake her suddenly would be of no use.  It will be a pity if anybody comes by.  I believe that every one on board is asleep.  Thanks be to Providence for that mercy.  Well, and Homo?  Where is he, I wonder?  In all this confusion I forgot to tie him up.  I do not know what I am doing.  It is more than an hour since I have seen him.  I suppose he has been to look for his supper somewhere ashore.  I hope nothing has happened to him.  Homo!  Homo!”

Homo struck his tail softly on the planks of the deck.

“You are there.  Oh! you are there!  Thank God for that.  If Homo had been lost, it would have been too much to bear.  She has moved her arm.  Perhaps she is going to awake.  Quiet, Homo!  The tide is turning.  We shall sail directly.  I think it will be a fine night.  There is no wind:  the flag droops.  We shall have a good passage.  I do not know what moon it is, but there is scarcely a stir in the clouds.  There will be no swell.  It will be a fine night.  Her cheek is pale; it is only weakness!  No, it is flushed; it is only the fever.  Stay!  It is rosy.  She is well!  I can no longer see clearly.  My poor Homo, I no longer see distinctly.  So we must begin life afresh.  We must set to work again.  There are only we two left, you see.  We will work for her, both of us!  She is our child, Ah! the vessel moves!  We are off!  Good-bye, London!  Good evening! good-night!  To the devil with horrible London!”