I found it hard to do that at first, for a feeling of shame came over
me, and I thought:
"You coward, you forgot all about God when things were going well with
you, but now that they are tumbling down, and death seems certain, you
whine and want to go where you never dreamt of going in your days of
ease and strength."
I got over that, though--there's nothing except death a man doesn't get
over down there--and a dark night came when (the ice breaking from the
cliffs of the Cape with a sound that made me think of my last evening at
Castle Raa) I found myself folding my hands and praying to the God of my
childhood, not for myself but for my dear one, that He before whom the
strongest of humanity were nothing at all, would take her into His
Fatherly keeping.
"Help her! Help her! _I_ can do no more."
It was just when I was down to that extremity that it pleased Providence
to come to my relief. The very next morning I was awakened out of my
broken sleep by the sound of a gun, followed by such a yell from Treacle
as was enough to make you think the sea-serpent had got hold of his old
buttocks.
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