But, in truth, I had the greatest difficulty in the world in preventing Andre from rushing out upon the cannibals, and snatching the odious food from their clutches.
I represented to him the hopelessness of his attempt, and tried to reconcile him by telling him that if they liked the food they had a right to it.

Hobart had not been murdered; he had died by his own hand; and, after all, as the boatswain had once remarked to me, "it was better to eat a dead man than a live one." Do what I would, however, I could not quiet Andre's feeling of abhorrence; in his disgust and loathing he seemed for the time to have quite forgotten his own sufferings.
Meanwhile, there was no concealing the truth that we were ourselves dying of starvation, whilst our eight companions would probably, by their loathsome diet, escape that frightful destiny.

Owing to his secret hoard of provisions Hobart had been by far the strongest amongst us; he had been supported, so that no organic disease had affected his tissues, and really might be said to be in good health when his chagrin drove him to his desperate suicide.

But what was I thinking of! whither were my meditations carrying me away?
was it not coming to pass that the cannibals were rousing my envy instead of exciting my horror?
Very shortly after this I heard Dowlas talking about the possibility of obtaining salt by evaporating sea-water in the sun; "and then," he added, "we can salt down the rest." The boatswain assented to what the carpenter had said, and probably the suggestion was adopted.
Silence, the most profound, now reigns upon the raft.

I presume that nearly all have gone to sleep.