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The Country of the Blind and Other Stories - The Sea Raiders · The H. G. Wells Library

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  Speaker 1: Section thirteen of the Country of the Blind and Other
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  Speaker 1: Stories by H. G. Wells. This LibriVox recording is in
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  Speaker 1: the public domain. Read by Peter Yearsley The Sea Raiders,
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  Speaker 1: Part One. Until the extraordinary affair at Sidmouth, the peculiar
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  Speaker 1: species Haplatothius ferox was known to science only generically on
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  Speaker 1: the strength of a half digested tentacle obtained near the
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  Speaker 1: Azores and a decaying body pecked by birds and nibbled
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  Speaker 1: by fish, found early in eighteen ninety six by mister
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  Speaker 1: Jennings near Land's End. In no department of zoological science. Indeed,
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  Speaker 1: are we quite so much in the dark as with
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  Speaker 1: regard to the deep sea kephalopods. A mere accident, for instance,
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  Speaker 1: it was that led to the Prince of Monaco's discovery
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  Speaker 1: of nearly a dozen new forms in the summer of
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  Speaker 1: eighteen ninety five, a discoscovery in which the before mentioned
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  Speaker 1: tentacle was included. It chanced that a cachelot was killed
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  Speaker 1: off Terceira by some sperm whalers, and in its last struggles,
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  Speaker 1: charged almost to the Prince's yacht, missed, it, rolled under,
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  Speaker 1: and died within twenty yards of his rudder. And in
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  Speaker 1: its agony it threw up a number of large objects,
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  Speaker 1: which the Prince, dimly perceiving they were strange and important,
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  Speaker 1: was by a happy expedient able to secure before they sank.
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  Speaker 1: He set his screws in motion and kept them circly
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  Speaker 1: in the vortices thus created, until a boat could be lowered.
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  Speaker 1: And these specimens were whole kefalopods and fragments of keflopods,
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  Speaker 1: some of gigantic proportions, and almost all of them unknown
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  Speaker 1: to science. It would seem, indeed, that these large and
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  Speaker 1: agile creatures living in the middle depths of the sea must,
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  Speaker 1: to a large extent forever remain unknown to us, since
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  Speaker 1: under water they are too nimble for nets, and it
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  Speaker 1: is only by such rare, unlooked for accidents that specimens
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  Speaker 1: can be obtained. In the case of Haplotuthius Ferox, for instance,
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  Speaker 1: we are still altogether ignorant of its habitat, as ignorant
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  Speaker 1: as we are of the breeding ground of the herring
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  Speaker 1: or the sea ways of the salmon, and zoologists are
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  Speaker 1: altogether at a loss to account for its sudden appearance
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  Speaker 1: on our coast. Possibly it was the stress of a
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  Speaker 1: hunger migration that drove it hither out of the deep.
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  Speaker 1: But it will be perhaps better to avoid necessarily inconclusive discussion,
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  Speaker 1: and to proceed at once with our narrative. The first
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  Speaker 1: human being to set eyes upon a living haplotuthis the
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  Speaker 1: first human being to survive. That is, for there can
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  Speaker 1: be little doubt now that the wave of bathing fatalities
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  Speaker 1: and boating accidents that traveled along the coast of Cornwall
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  Speaker 1: and Devon in early May was due to this cause.
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  Speaker 1: Was a retired tea dealer of the name of Fison,
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  Speaker 1: who was stopping at a Sidmouth boarding house. It was
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  Speaker 1: in the afternoon, and he was walking along the cliff
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  Speaker 1: path between Sidmouth and Ladderum Bay. The cliffs in this
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  Speaker 1: direction are very high, but down the red face of them,
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  Speaker 1: in one place a kind of ladder staircase has been made.
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  Speaker 1: He was near this when his attention was attracted by
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  Speaker 1: what at first he thought to be a cluster of
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  Speaker 1: birds struggling over a fragment of food that caught the
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  Speaker 1: sunlight and glistened pinkish white. The tide was right out,
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  Speaker 1: and this object was not only far below him, but
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  Speaker 1: remote across a broad waste of rock reefs covered with
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  Speaker 1: dark seaweed, and it dispersed with silvery, shining tidal pools,
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  Speaker 1: and he was moreover dazzled by the brightness of the
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  Speaker 1: further water. In a minute, regarding this again, he perceived
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  Speaker 1: that his judgment was in fault. For over this struggle
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  Speaker 1: circled a number of birds, jackdaws and gulls, for the
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  Speaker 1: most part, the latter gleaming blindingly when the sunlight smote
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  Speaker 1: their wings, and they seemed minute in comparison with it.
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  Speaker 1: And his curiosity was perhaps aroused all the more strongly
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  Speaker 1: because of his first insufficient explanations. As he had nothing
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  Speaker 1: better to do than amuse himself, he decided to make
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  Speaker 1: this object, whatever it was, the goal of his afternoon
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  Speaker 1: walk instead of ladderum Bay, conceiving it might perhaps be
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  Speaker 1: a great fish of some sort, stranded by some chance
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  Speaker 1: and flapping about in its distress. And so he hurried
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  Speaker 1: down the long steep ladder, stopping at intervals of thirty
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  Speaker 1: feet or so to take breath and scan the mysterious movement.
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  Speaker 1: At the foot of the cliff, he was, of course
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  Speaker 1: nearer his object than he had been, But on the
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  Speaker 1: other hand, it now came up against the incandescent sky
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  Speaker 1: beneath the sun, so as to seem dark and indistinct.
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  Speaker 1: Whatever was pinkish of it was now hidden by a
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  Speaker 1: skerry of weedy boulders. But he perceived that it was
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  Speaker 1: made up of seven rounded bodies, distinct or connected, and
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  Speaker 1: that the birds kept up a constant croaking and screaming,
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  Speaker 1: but seemed afraid to approach it too closely. Mister Phison,
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  Speaker 1: torn by curiosity, began picking his way across the wave
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  Speaker 1: worn rocks, and, finding the wet seaweed that covered them
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  Speaker 1: thickly rendered them extremely slippery, he stopped, removed his shoes
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  Speaker 1: and socks, and rolled his trousers above his knees. His
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  Speaker 1: object was, of course, merely to avoid stumbling into the
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  Speaker 1: rocky pools about him, And perhaps he was rather glad,
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  Speaker 1: as all men are, of an excuse to resume, even
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  Speaker 1: for a moment, the sensations of his boyhood. At any rate,
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  Speaker 1: it is to this no doubt that he owes his life.
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  Speaker 1: He approached his mark with all the assurance which the
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  Speaker 1: absolute security of this country against all forms of animal
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  Speaker 1: life gives its inhabitants. The round bodies moved to and
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  Speaker 1: fro but it was only when he surmounted the scarry
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  Speaker 1: of boulders I have mentioned that he realized the horrible
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  Speaker 1: nature of the discovery. It came upon him with some suddenness.
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  Speaker 1: The rounded bodies fell apart as he came into sight
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  Speaker 1: over the ridge, and displayed the pinkish object to be
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  Speaker 1: the partially devoured body of a human being. But whether
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  Speaker 1: of a man or woman, he was unable to say.
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  Speaker 1: And the rounded bodies were new and ghastly looking creatures
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  Speaker 1: in shape somewhat resembling an octopus, with huge and very
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  Speaker 1: long and flexible tentacles coiled copiously on the ground. The
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  Speaker 1: skin had a glistening texture, unpleasant to see, like shiny leather.
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  Speaker 1: The downward bend of the tentacle surrounded mouth. The curious
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  Speaker 1: excrescence at the bend the tentacles, and the large, intelligent
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  Speaker 1: eyes gave the creatures a grotesque suggestion of a face.
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  Speaker 1: They were the size of a fair sized swine about
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  Speaker 1: the body, and the tentacles seemed to him to be
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  Speaker 1: many feet in length. There were he thinks seven or
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  Speaker 1: eight at least of the creatures, twenty yards beyond them
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  Speaker 1: amid the surf of the now returning tide, two others
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  Speaker 1: were emerging from the sea. Their bodies lay flatly on
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  Speaker 1: the rocks, and their eyes regarded him with evil interest.
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  Speaker 1: But it does not appear that mister Fison was afraid,
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  Speaker 1: or that he realized that he was in any danger.
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  Speaker 1: Possibly his confidence is to be ascribed to the limpness
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  Speaker 1: of their attitudes. But he was horrified, of course, and
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  Speaker 1: intensely excited and indignant at such revolting creatures preying upon
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  Speaker 1: human flesh. He thought they had chanced upon a drowned body.
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  Speaker 1: He shouted to them with the idea of driving them off,
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  Speaker 1: and finally they did not budge cast about him, picked
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  Speaker 1: up a big rounded lump of rock and flung it
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  Speaker 1: at one, and then slowly uncoiling their tentacles. They all
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  Speaker 1: began moving towards him, creeping at first deliberately, and making
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  Speaker 1: a soft purring sound to each other. In a moment,
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  Speaker 1: mister Fison realized that he was in danger. He shouted again,
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  Speaker 1: threw both his boots, and started off with a leap
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  Speaker 1: Forthwith twenty yards off, he stopped and faced about, judging
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  Speaker 1: them slow, and behold, the tentacles of their leader were
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  Speaker 1: already poring over the rocky ridge on which he had
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  Speaker 1: just been standing. At that he shouted again, but this
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  Speaker 1: time not threatening but a cry of dismay, and began jumping, striding, slipping,
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  Speaker 1: wading across the uneven expanse between him and the beach.
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  Speaker 1: The tall red cliffs seemed suddenly at a vast distance,
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  Speaker 1: and he saw as though they were creatures in another world.
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  Speaker 1: Two minute workmen engaged in the repair of the ladder way,
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  Speaker 1: and little suspecting the race of life that was beginning
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  Speaker 1: below them. At one time he could hear the creatures
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  Speaker 1: splashing in the pool not a dozen feet behind him,
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  Speaker 1: and once he slipped and almost fell, they chased him
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  Speaker 1: to the very foot of the cliffs, and desisted only
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  Speaker 1: when he had been joined by the workmen at the
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  Speaker 1: foot of the ladder way up the cliff. All three
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  Speaker 1: of the men pelted them with stones for a time,
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  Speaker 1: and then hurried to the cliff top and along the
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  Speaker 1: path towards Sidmouth to secure assistance and a boat, and
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  Speaker 1: to rescue the desecrated body from the clutches of these
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  Speaker 1: abominable creatures. Part two, And as if he had not
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  Speaker 1: already been in sufficient peril that day, mister Fison went
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  Speaker 1: with the boat to point out the exact spot of
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  Speaker 1: his adventure. As the tide was down, it required a
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  Speaker 1: considerable detour to reach the spot, and when at last
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  Speaker 1: they came off the ladder way, the mangled body had disappeared.
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  Speaker 1: The water was now running in submerging first one slab
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  Speaker 1: of slimy rock and then another, and the four men
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  Speaker 1: in the boat, the workmen, that is, the boatman and
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  Speaker 1: mister Fison, now turned their attention from the bearings off
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  Speaker 1: shore to the water beneath the keel. At first they
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  Speaker 1: could see little below them save a dark jungle of
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  Speaker 1: Laminaria with an occasional darting fish. Their mines were set
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  Speaker 1: on adventure, and they expressed their disappointment freely. But presently
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  Speaker 1: they saw one of the monsters swimming through the water
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  Speaker 1: seaward with a curious rolling motion that suggested to mister
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  Speaker 1: Fison the spinning roll of a captive balloon. Almost immediately after,
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  Speaker 1: the waving streamers of Lamonaria were extraordinarily perturbed, parted for
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  Speaker 1: a moment, and three of the beasts became darkly visible,
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  Speaker 1: struggling for what was probably some fragment of the drowned man.
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  Speaker 1: In a moment the opious olive green ribbons had poured
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  Speaker 1: again over this writhing group. At that all four men,
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  Speaker 1: greatly excited, began beating the water with oars and shouting,
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  Speaker 1: And immediately they saw a tumultuous movement among the weeds.
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  Speaker 1: They desisted to see more clearly, and as soon as
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  Speaker 1: the water was smooth, as it seemed to them, the
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  Speaker 1: whole sea bottom among the weeds set with eyes ugly swine,
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  Speaker 1: cried one of the men, Why these dozens and forthwith
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  Speaker 1: the things began to rise through the water about them.
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  Speaker 1: Mister Fison has since described to the writer this startling
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  Speaker 1: eruption out of the waving Laminaria meadows. To him, it
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  Speaker 1: seemed to occupy a considerable time, but it is probable
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  Speaker 1: that really it was an affair of a few seconds.
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  Speaker 1: Only for a time nothing but eyes. And then he
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  Speaker 1: speaks of tentacles streaming out and parting the weed fronds
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  Speaker 1: this way and that. Then these things growing larger, until
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  Speaker 1: at last the bottom was hidden by their intercoiling forms,
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  Speaker 1: and the tips of tentacles rose darkly here and there
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  Speaker 1: into the air above the swell of the waters. One
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  Speaker 1: came up boldly to the side of the boat, and
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  Speaker 1: clinging to this with three of its sucker set tentacles,
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  Speaker 1: threw four others over the gunwale, as if with an
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  Speaker 1: intention either of oversetting the boat or of clambering into it.
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  Speaker 1: Mister Fison at once caught up the boat hook, and
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  Speaker 1: jabbing furiously at the soft tentacles, forced it to desist.
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  Speaker 1: He was struck in the back and almost pitched overboard
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  Speaker 1: by the boatman, who was using his oar to resist
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  Speaker 1: a similar attack on the other side of the boat.
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  Speaker 1: But the tentacles on either side at once relaxed their hold,
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  Speaker 1: slid out of sight, and splashed into the water. We'd
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  Speaker 1: better get out of this, said mister Fison, who was
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  Speaker 1: trembling violently. He went to the tiller, while the boatmen
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  Speaker 1: and one of the workmen seated themselves and began rowing.
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  Speaker 1: The other workmen stood up in the fore part of
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  Speaker 1: the boat with the boat hook, ready to strike any
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  Speaker 1: more tentacles that might appear. Nothing else seems to have
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  Speaker 1: been said. Mister Phison had expressed the common feeling beyond
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  Speaker 1: amendment in a hushed, scared mood. With faces white and drawn,
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  Speaker 1: they set about escaping from the position into which they
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  Speaker 1: had so recklessly blundered, But the oars had scarcely dropped
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  Speaker 1: into the water before dark. Tapering serpentine ropes had bound
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  Speaker 1: them and were about the rudder and creeping up the
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  Speaker 1: sides of the boat. With a looping motion, came the suckers. Again.
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  Speaker 1: The men gripped their oars and pulled, but it was
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  Speaker 1: like trying to move a boat in a floating raft
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  Speaker 1: of weeds. Help here, cried the boatman, and mister Fison
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  Speaker 1: and the second workman rushed to help lug at the oar.
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  Speaker 1: Then the man with the boat hook his name was
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  Speaker 1: Yuen or yu En, sprang up with a curse and
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  Speaker 1: began striking downward over the side as far as he
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  Speaker 1: could reach, at the bank of tentacles that now clustered
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  Speaker 1: along the boat's bottom. And at the same time, the
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  Speaker 1: two rowers stood up to get a better purchase for
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  Speaker 1: the recovery of their oars. The boatman handed his to
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  Speaker 1: mister Fison, who lugged desperately, and meanwhile the boatman opened
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  Speaker 1: a big clasp knife, and, leaning over the side of
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  Speaker 1: the boat, began hacking at the spiring arms upon the
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  Speaker 1: oar shaft. Mister Pison, staggering with the quivering rocking of
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  Speaker 1: the boat, his teeth set, his breath coming short, and
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  Speaker 1: the veins starting on his hands as he pulled at
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  Speaker 1: his oar, suddenly cast his eyes seaward, and there, not
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  Speaker 1: fifty yards off across the long rollers of the incoming tide,
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  Speaker 1: was a large boat standing in towards them, with three
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  Speaker 1: women and a little child in it. A boatman was rowing,
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  Speaker 1: and a little man in a pink ribbon straw hat
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  Speaker 1: and whites stood in the stern hailing them. For a moment,
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  Speaker 1: of course, mister Fison thought of help, and then he
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  Speaker 1: thought of the child. He abandoned his oar forthwith, threw
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  Speaker 1: up his arms in a frontic gesture, and screamed to
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  Speaker 1: the party in the boat to keep away, for God's sake.
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  Speaker 1: It's as much for the modesty and courage of mister
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  Speaker 1: Fison that he does not seem to be aware that
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  Speaker 1: there was any quality of heroism in his action. At
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  Speaker 1: this juncture. The owe he had abandoned was at once
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  Speaker 1: drawn under and presently reappeared floating about twenty yards away.
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  Speaker 1: At the same moment, mister Fison felt the boat under
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  Speaker 1: him lurch violently, and a hoarse scream. A prolonged cry
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  Speaker 1: of terror from Hill, the boatman caused him to forget
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  Speaker 1: the party of excursionists altogether. He turned and saw Hill
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  Speaker 1: crouching by the forward rollock, his face convulsed with terror,
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  Speaker 1: and his right arm over the side and drawn tightly down.
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  Speaker 1: He gave now a succession of short, sharp cries ah
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  Speaker 1: oh ah ah. Mister Fison believes that he must have
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  Speaker 1: been hacking at the tentacles below the water line and
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  Speaker 1: have been grasped by them, But of course it is
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  Speaker 1: quite impossible to say now certainly what had happened. The
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  Speaker 1: boat was heeling over so that the gunwale was within
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  Speaker 1: ten inches of the water, and both Ewan and the
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  Speaker 1: other laborer were striking down into the water with oar
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  Speaker 1: and boat hook on either side of Hill's arm. Mister
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  Speaker 1: Phison instinctively placed himself to counterpoise them. Then, Hill, who
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  Speaker 1: was a burly, powerful man, made a strenuous effort and
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  Speaker 1: rose almost to a standing position. He lifted his arm
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  Speaker 1: indeed clean out of the water. Hanging to it was
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  Speaker 1: a complicated tangle of brown ropes, and the eyes of
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  Speaker 1: one of the brutes that had hold of him, glaring
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  Speaker 1: straight and resolute showed momentarily above the surface. The boat
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  Speaker 1: healed more and more, and the green brown water came
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  Speaker 1: pouring in a cascade over the side. Then Hill slipped
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  Speaker 1: and fell with his ribs across the side, and his
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  Speaker 1: arm and the mass of tentacles about it splashed back
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  Speaker 1: into the water. He rolled over his boot kicked mister
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  Speaker 1: Phison's knee as that gentleman rushed forward to seize him,
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  Speaker 1: and in another moment, fresh tentacles had whipped about his
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  Speaker 1: waist and neck, and after a brief convulsive struggle in
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  Speaker 1: which the boat was nearly capsized, Hill was lugged overboard.
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  Speaker 1: The boat righted with a violent jerk that all but
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  Speaker 1: sent mister Fison over the other side and hid the
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  Speaker 1: struggle in the water from his eyes. He stood staggering
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  Speaker 1: to recover his balance for a moment, and as he
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  Speaker 1: did so, he became aware that the struggle and the
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  Speaker 1: inflowing tide had carried them close upon the weedy rocks again,
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  Speaker 1: not four yards off. A table of rock still rose
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  Speaker 1: in rhythmic movements above the in wash of the tide.
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  Speaker 1: In a moment, mister Phison seized the oar from ewan
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  Speaker 1: gave one vigorous stroke, then, dropping it, ran to the
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  Speaker 1: boughs and leapt. He felt his feet slide over the rock,
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  Speaker 1: and by a frantic effort, leaped again towards a further mass.
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  Speaker 1: He stumbled over this, came to his knees and rose again.
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  Speaker 1: Look help, cried some one, and a large, drab body
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  Speaker 1: struck him. He was not flat into a tidal pool
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  Speaker 1: by one of the workmen, and as he went down
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  Speaker 1: he heard smothered, choking cries that he believed at the
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  Speaker 1: time came from Hill. Then he found himself marveling at
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  Speaker 1: the shrillness and variety of Hill's voice. Some one jumped
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  Speaker 1: over him, and a curving rush of foamy water poured
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  Speaker 1: over him and passed. He scrambled to his feet, dripping,
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  Speaker 1: and without looking seaward, ran as fast as his terror
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  Speaker 1: would let him shoreward. Before him, over the flat space
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  Speaker 1: of scattered rocks, stumbled the two workmen, one a dozen
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  Speaker 1: yards in front of the other. He looked over his
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  Speaker 1: shoulder at last, and seeing that he was not pursued,
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  Speaker 1: faced about. He was astonished. From the moment of the
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  Speaker 1: rising of the kefflopods out of the water. He had
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  Speaker 1: been acting too swiftly to fully comprehend his actions. Now
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  Speaker 1: it seemed to him as if he had suddenly jumped
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  Speaker 1: out of an evil dream. For there were the sky,
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  Speaker 1: cloudless and blazing with the afternoon sun, the sea weltering
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  Speaker 1: under its pitiless brightness, the soft, creamy foam of the
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  Speaker 1: breaking water, and the low, long, dark ridges of rock.
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  Speaker 1: The righted boat floated, rising and falling gently on the swell,
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  Speaker 1: about a dozen yards from shore Hill and the monsters.
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  Speaker 1: All the stress and tumult of that fierce fight for
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: life had vanished, as though they had never been. Mister
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  Speaker 1: Fison's heart was beating violently. He was throbbing to the
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  Speaker 1: finger tips, and his breath came deep. There was something missing.
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: For some seconds, he could not think clearly enough what
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  Speaker 1: this might be, sun, sky, sea, rocks. What was it?
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: Then he remembered the boat load of excursionists. It had vanished.
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  Speaker 1: He wondered whether that he had imagined it. He turned
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: and saw the two workmen standing side by side under
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: the projecting masses of the tall pink cliffs. He hesitated
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: whether he should make one last attempt to save the
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: man Hill. His physical excitement seemed to desert him suddenly
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: and leave him aimless and helpless. He turned shoreward, stumbling
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: and wading towards his two companions. He looked back again,
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: and there were now two boats floating, and the one
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: farthest out at sea pitched clumsily bottom upward. Part three.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: So it was haplotuthis Ferox made its appearance upon the
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: Devonshire coast. So far this has been its most serious aggression.
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: Mister Fison's account, taken together with the wave of boating
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: and bathing casualties to which I have already alluded, and
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: the absence of fish from the Cornish coasts that year,
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: points clearly to a shoal of these ferocious deep sea
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: monsters prowling slowly along the sub tidal coastline. Hunger migration
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: has I know, been suggested as the force that drove
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: them hither, But for my own part, I prefer to
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: believe the alternative theory of Hemsley Hemsley holes, that a
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: pack or shoal of these creatures may have become enamored
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: of human flesh by the accident of a founded ship
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: sinking among them, and have wandered in search of it
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: out of their accustomed zone. First way laying and following ships,
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: and so coming to our shores in the wake of
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: the Atlantic traffic. But to discuss Hemley's cogent and admirably
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: stated arguments would be out of place here. It would
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: seem that the appetites of the shoal were satisfied by
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: the catch of eleven people. For so far as can
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: be ascertained, there were ten people in the second boat,
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: and certainly these creatures gave no further signs of their
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: presence off Sidmouth that day. The coast between Seaton and
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: Budley Salterton was patrolled all that evening and night by
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: four preventive service boats, the men in which were armed
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: with harpoons and cutlasses, and as the evening advanced, a
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: number of more or less similarly equipped expeditions organized by
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: private individuals joined them. Mister Fison took no part in
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: any of these expeditions. About midnight, excited hales were heard
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: from a boat about a couple of miles out at
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: sea to the southeast of Sidmouth, and a lantern was
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: seen waving in a strange manner to and fro and
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: up and down. The nearer boats at once hurried towards
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: the alarm. The venturesome occupants of the boat, a seaman,
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: a curate, and two schoolboys, had actually seen the monsters
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: passing under their boat. The creatures, it seemed like most
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: deep sea organisms, were phosphorescent, and they had been floating
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: five fathoms deep or so, like creatures of moonshine through
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: the blackness of the water. Their tentacles retracted and, as
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: if asleep, rolling over and over and moving slowly in
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: a wedge like formation towards the southeast. These people told
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: their story in gesticulated fragments, as first one boat drew alongside,
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: and then another. At last there was a little fleet
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: of eight or nine boats collected together, and from them
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: a tumult like the chatter of a market place, rose
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: into the stillness of the night. There was little or
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: no disposition to pursue the shoal. The people had neither
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: weapons nor experience for such a dubious chase, and presently,
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: even with a certain relief, it may be, the boats
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: turned shorewood. And now, to tell what is perhaps the
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: most astonishing fact in this whole astonishing raid, we have
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: not the slightest knowledge of the subsequent movements of the shoal,
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: Although the whole southwest coast was now alert for it.
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: But it may perhaps be significant that a cachelot was
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: stranded off Sark On June the third, two weeks and
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: three days after this Sidmuth affair, a living Haplothuthis came
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: ashore on Calais Sands. It was alive because several witnesses
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: saw its tentacles moving in a convulsive way, but it
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: is probable that it was dying. A gentleman named Pouchet
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: obtained a rifle and shut it. That was the last
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: appearance of a living haplothuthis. No others were seen on
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: the French coast. On the fifteenth of June, a dead carcass,
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: almost complete, was washed ashore near Torquay, and a few
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: days later a boat from the Marine Biological Station in
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: aged In dredging off Plymouth picked up a rotting specimen
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: slashed deeply with a cutless wound. How the former had
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: come by its death it is impossible to say. And
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: on the last day of June, mister Egbert Caine, an
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: artist bathing near New Lynn, threw up his arms, shrieked,
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: and was drawn under. A friend bathing with him made
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: no attempt to save him, but swam at once for
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: the shore. This is the last fact to tell of
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: this extraordinary raid from the deeper sea. Whether it is
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: really the last of these horrible creatures, it is as
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: yet premature to say. But it is believed, and certainly
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: it is to be hoped, that they have returned now,
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: and returned for good, to the sunless depths of the
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: Middle Seas, out of which they have so strangely and
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: so mysteriously arisen. End of Section thirteen did