
conversation. The sailor, Johnson, was steering. As I started toward the weather
side I saw him make a sudden motion with his head, which I mistook for a token
of recognition and good morning. In reality, he was attempting to warn me to
throw my ashes over the lee side. Unconscious of my blunder, I passed by Wolf
Larsen and the hunter and flung the ashes over the side to windward. The wind
drove them back, and not only over me, but over Henderson and Wolf Larsen. The
next instant the latter kicked me, violently, as a cur is kicked. I had not
realized there could be so much pain in a kick. I reeled away from him and
leaned against the cabin in a half-fainting condition. Everything was swimming
before my eyes, and I turned sick. The nausea overpowered me, and I managed to
crawl to the side of the vessel. But Wolf Larsen did not follow me up. Brushing
the ashes from his clothes, he had resumed his conversation with Henderson.
Johansen, who had seen the affair from the break of the poop, sent a couple of
sailors aft to clean up the mess.
    Later in the morning I received a surprise of a totally different sort.
Following the cook's instructions, I had gone into Wolf Larsen's state-room to
put it to rights and make the bed. Against the wall, near the head of the bunk,
was a rack filled with books. I glanced over them, noting with astonishment such
names as Shakespeare, Tennyson, Poe, and De Quincey. There were scientific
works, too, among which were represented men such as Tyndall, Proctor, and
Darwin. Astronomy and physics were represented, and I remarked Bulfinch's »Age
of Fable,« Shaw's »History of English and American Literature,« and Johnson's
»Natural History« in two large volumes. Then there were a number of grammars,
such as Metcalf's, and Reed and Kellogg's; and I smiled as I saw a copy of »The
Dean's English.«
    I could not reconcile these books with the man from what I had seen of him,
and I wondered if he could possibly read them. But when I came to make the bed I
found, between the blankets, dropped apparently as he had sunk off to sleep, a
complete Browning, the Cambridge Edition. It was open at »In a Balcony,« and I
noticed, here and there, passages underlined in pencil. Further, letting drop
the volume during a
