To starve in the cave was no ending for David Crawfurd.

Far better to join Laputa in the depths in a manly hazard for liberty.
My obstinacy and irritation cheered me.

What had become of the lack-lustre young fool who had mooned here a few minutes back.

Now I was as tense and strung for effort as the day I had ridden from Blaauwildebeestefontein to Umvelos'.

I felt like a runner in the last lap of a race.