[The Sea-Wolf by Jack London]@TWC D-Link book
The Sea-Wolf

CHAPTER I
12/22

It must have tried, too, the nerves of the red-faced man, for I have another picture which will never fade from my mind.

The stout gentleman is stuffing the magazine into his overcoat pocket and looking on curiously.
A tangled mass of women, with drawn, white faces and open mouths, is shrieking like a chorus of lost souls; and the red-faced man, his face now purplish with wrath, and with arms extended overhead as in the act of hurling thunderbolts, is shouting, "Shut up! Oh, shut up!" I remember the scene impelled me to sudden laughter, and in the next instant I realized I was becoming hysterical myself; for these were women of my own kind, like my mother and sisters, with the fear of death upon them and unwilling to die.

And I remember that the sounds they made reminded me of the squealing of pigs under the knife of the butcher, and I was struck with horror at the vividness of the analogy.

These women, capable of the most sublime emotions, of the tenderest sympathies, were open-mouthed and screaming.

They wanted to live, they were helpless, like rats in a trap, and they screamed.
The horror of it drove me out on deck.


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