The men tumbled over the side with lumbering abandonment, and met each other like schoolboys who gather in the common-room after a holiday.

As Blair said, they were like a lot of Newfoundland puppies.

Poor Tom Betts came up among the roistering crowd--pale, weary, and with that strange, disquieting smile which flits over sick men's faces; he was received as an interesting infant, and his narratives concerning the marvellous skill of the doctor were enough to supply the fleet with gossip for a month.

None of the "weeds" of the fleet were on board, and the assembly might be taken as representing the pick of the North Sea population.
With every observant faculty on the stretch Ferrier strolled from group to group, chatting with man after man; no one was in the least familiar, but the doctor was struck with the simple cordiality of all the fellows.
A subtle something was at work, and it gradually dawned on the young student that these good folk had the sentiment of brotherhood which is given by a common cause and a common secret.

The early Christians loved one another, and here, on that grey sea, our sceptic saw the early Christian movement beginning all over again, with every essential feature reproduced.