His arms became stiff, his legs lost their flexibility, and he was almost breathless.
He shouted again.

The two sailors redoubled their efforts, and one of them cried in Italian, "Courage!" The word reached his ear as a wave which he no longer had the strength to surmount passed over his head.

He rose again to the surface, struggled with the last desperate effort of a drowning man, uttered a third cry, and felt himself sinking, as if the fatal cannon shot were again tied to his feet.

The water passed over his head, and the sky turned gray.

A convulsive movement again brought him to the surface.