The worst appeared inevitable; and as I paced the deck, hour after hour, I found myself afflicted with Wolf Larsen's repulsive ideas.

What was it all about?
Where was the grandeur of life that it should permit such wanton destruction of human souls?
It was a cheap and sordid thing after all, this life, and the sooner over the better.

Over and done with! I, too, leaned upon the rail and gazed longingly into the sea, with the certainty that sooner or later I should be sinking down, down, through the cool green depths of its oblivion..