Still the fear-smitten decapods wandered, seeking seclusion from the coming enemy, and finding none to their mind. Still the crowds of their victims rushed blindly from shoal to shoal, plunging into depths unfitted for them, or rising into shallows where their natural food was not. And the whole sea was troubled, until at last there appeared, grim and vast, the advance-guard of the sperm whales, and hurled itself with joyful anticipation upon the shrinking convolutions of those hideous monsters that had so long dominated the dark places of the sea. For the whales it was a time of feasting hitherto without parallel. Without any fear, uncaring to take even the most elementary precautions against a defeat which they felt to be an impossible contingency, they sought out and devoured one after another of these vast uglinesses, already looked upon by them as their natural provision, their store of food accumulated of purpose against their coming. Occasionally, it is true, some rash youngster, full of pride, and rejoicing in his pre-eminence over all life in the depths, would hurl himself into a smoky network of far-spreading tentacles which would wrap him round so completely that his jaws were fast bound together, his flukes would vainly essay to propel him any whither, and he would presently perish miserably, his cable-like sinews falling slackly and his lungs suffused with crimson brine. Even then, the advantage gained by the triumphant Kraken was a barren one, for in every case the bulk of the victim was too great, his body too firm in its build, for the victor, despite his utmost efforts, to succeed in devouring his prize. So that the disappointed Kraken had perforce to witness the gradual disappearance of his lawful prize beneath the united efforts of myriads of tiny sea-scavengers, secure in their insignificance against any attack from him, and await with tremor extending to the remotest extremity of every tentacle, the retribution that he felt sure would speedily follow.

This desultory warfare was waged for long, until, driven by despair to a community of interest unknown before, the Krakens gradually sought one another out with but a single idea—that of combining against the new enemy; for, knowing to what an immense size their kind could attain in the remoter fastnesses of ocean, they could not yet bring themselves to believe that they were to become the helpless prey of these new-comers, visitors of yesterday, coming from the cramped acreage of the land into the limitless fields of ocean, and invading the immemorial freeholds of its hitherto unassailable sovereigns. From the remotest recesses of the ocean they came, that grisly gathering—came in ever-increasing hosts, their silent progress spreading unprecedented dismay among the fairer inhabitants of the sea. Figure to yourselves, if you can, the advance of this terrible host. But the effort is vain. Not even Martin, that frenzied delineator of the frightful halls of hell, the scenes of the Apocalypse, and the agonies of the Deluge, could have done justice to the terrors of such a scene. Only dimly can we imagine what must have been the appearance of those vast masses of writhing flesh, as through the palely gleaming phosphorescence of the depths they sped backwards in leaps of a hundred fathoms each, their terrible arms, close-clustered together, streaming behind like Medusa’s hair magnified ten thousand times in size, and with each snaky tress bearing a thousand mouths instead of one.

So they converged upon the place of meeting, an area of the sea-bed nowhere more than 500 fathoms in depth, from whose rugged floor rose irregularly stupendous columnar masses of lava hurled upwards by the cosmic forces below in a state of incandescence and solidified as they rose, assuming many fantastic shapes, and affording perfect harbourage to such dire scourges of the sea as were now making the place their rendezvous. For, strangely enough, this marvellous portion of the submarine world was more densely peopled with an infinite variety of sea-folk than any other; its tepid waters seemed to bring forth abundantly of all kinds of fish, crustacea, and creeping things. Sharks in all their fearsome varieties prowled greasily about, scenting for dead things whereon to gorge, shell-fish from the infinitesimal globigerina up to the gigantic clam whose shells were a yard each in diameter; crabs, lobsters, and other freakish varieties of crustacea of a size and ugliness unknown to day lurked in every crevice, while about and among all these scavengers flitted the happy, lovely fish in myriads of glorious hues matching the tender shades of the coral groves that sprang from the summits of those sombre lava columns beneath. Hitherto this happy hunting-ground had not been invaded by the sea-mammals. None of the air-breathing inhabitants of the ocean had ventured into its gloomy depths, or sought their prey among the blazing shallows of the surface-reefs, although no more favourable place for their exertions could possibly have been selected over all the wide sea. It had long been a favourite haunt of the Kraken, for whom it was, as aforesaid, an ideal spot, but now it was to witness a sight unparalleled in ocean history. Heralded by an amazing series of under-waves, the gathering of monsters drew near. They numbered many thousands, and no one in all their hosts was of lesser magnitude than sixty feet long by thirty in girth of body alone. From that size they increased until some—the acknowledged leaders—discovered themselves like islands, their cylindrical carcases huge as that of an ocean liner, and their tentacles capable of overspreading an entire village.

In concentric rings they assembled, all heads pointing outward, the mightiest within, and four clear avenues through the circles left for coming and going. Contrary to custom, but by mutual consent, all the tentacles lay closely arranged in parallel lines, not outspread to every quarter of the compass, and all a-work. They looked, indeed, in their inertia and silence, like nothing so much as an incalculable number of dead squid of enormous size neatly laid out at the whim of some giant’s fancy. Yet communication between them was active; a subtle interchange of experiences and plans went briskly on through the medium of the mobile element around them. The elder and mightier were full of disdain at the reports they were furnished with, utterly incredulous as to the ability of any created thing to injure them, and, as the time wore on, an occasional tremor was distinctly noticeable through the whole length of their tentacles, which boded no good to their smaller brethren. Doubtless but little longer was needed for the development of a great absorption of the weaker by the stronger, only that, darting into their midst like a lightning streak, came a messenger squid, bearing the news that a school of sperm whales, numbering at least ten thousand, were coming at top-speed direct for their place of meeting. Instantly to the farthest confines of that mighty gathering the message radiated, and as if by one movement there uprose from the sea-bed so dense a cloud of sepia that for many miles around the clear blue of the ocean became turbid, stagnant, and foul. Even the birds that hovered over those dark-brown waves took fright at this terrible phenomenon, to them utterly incomprehensible, and with discordant shrieks they fled in search of sweeter air and cleaner sea. But below the surface under cover of this thickest darkness there was the silence of death.

Twenty miles away, under the bright sunshine, an advance-guard of about a hundred sperm whales came rushing on. Line abreast, their bushy breath rising like the regular steam-jets from a row of engines, they dashed aside the welcoming wavelets, every sense alert, and full of eagerness for the consummation of their desires. Such had been their despatch that throughout the long journey of 500 leagues they had not once stayed for food, so that they were ravenous with hunger as well as full of fight. They passed, and before the foaming of their swift passage had ceased, the main body, spread over a space of thirty miles, came following on, the roar of their multitudinous march sounding like the voice of many waters. Suddenly the advance-guard, with stately elevation of the broad fans of their flukes, disappeared, and by one impulse the main body followed them. Down into the depths they bore, noting with dignified wonder the absence of all the usual inhabitants of the deep, until, with a thrill of joyful anticipation which set all their masses of muscle a-quiver, they recognized the scent of the prey. No thought of organized resistance presented itself; without a halt, or even the faintest slackening of their great rush, they plunged forward into the abysmal gloom; down, down withal into that wilderness of waiting devils. And so, in darkness and silence like that of the beginning of things, this great battle was joined. Whale after whale succumbed, anchored to the bottom by such bewildering entanglements, such enlacement of tentacles, that their vast strength was helpless to free them; their jaws were bound hard together, and even the wide sweep of their flukes gat no hold upon the slimy water. But the Decapods were in evil case. Assailed from above while their groping arms writhed about below, they found themselves more often locked in unreleasable hold of their fellows than they did of their enemies. And the quick-shearing jaws of those enemies shredded them into fragments, made nought of their bulk, revelled and frolicked among them, slaying, devouring, exulting. Again and again the triumphant mammals drew off for air and from satiety, went and lolled upon the sleek oily surface, in water now so thick that the fiercest hurricane that ever blew would have failed to raise a wave thereon.

So through a day and a night the slaying ceased not, except for these brief interludes, until those of the Decapods left alive had disentangled themselves from the débris of their late associates and returned with what speed they might to depths and crannies, where they fondly hoped their ravenous enemies could never come. They bore with them the certain knowledge that from henceforth they were no longer lords of the sea, that instead of being, as hitherto, devourers of all things living that crossed the radius of their outspread toils, they were now and for all time to be the prey of a nobler race of creatures, a higher order of being, and that at last they had taken their rightful position as creatures of usefulness in the vast economy of Creation.

THE SIAMESE LOCK

Even in these prosaic days of palatial passenger steamers, running upon lines from port to port almost as definite as railway metals, and keeping time with far more regularity than some railway trains that it would be easy to name, there are many eddies and backwaters of commerce still remaining where the romance of sea-traffic retains all the old pre-eminence, and events occur daily that are stranger than any fiction.

Notably is this the case on the Chinese coast, in whose innumerable creeks and bays there is a never-ceasing ebb and flow of queer craft, manned by a still queerer assortment of Eastern seafarers. And if it were not for that strange Lingua Franca of the Far East, to which our marvellous language lends itself with that ready adaptability which makes it one of the most widely-spoken in the world, the difficulties awaiting the white man who is called upon to rule over one of those motley crews would be well-nigh insuperable. As it is, men of our race who spend any length of time “knocking about” in Eastern seas always acquire an amazing mélange of tongues, which they themselves are totally unable to assign to their several sources of origin, even if they ever were to seriously undertake such a task. Needless, perhaps, to say that they have always something more important on hand than that. At least I had when, after a much longer spell ashore in Bangkok than I cared for, I one day prevailed upon a sturdy German skipper to ship me as mate of the little barque he commanded. She flew the Siamese flag, and belonged, as far as I was ever able to ascertain, to a Chinese firm in the humid Siamese capital, a sedate, taciturn trio of Celestials, who found it well worth their while to have Europeans in charge of her, even though they had to pay a long price for their services. My predecessor had been a “towny” of the skipper’s, a Norddeutscher from Rostock, who, with the second mate, a huge Dane, had been with the skipper in the same vessel for over two years. On the last voyage, however, during his watch on deck, while off the Paracels, he had silently disappeared, nor was the faintest inkling of his fate obtainable. When the skipper told me this in guttural German-English, I fancied he looked as if his air of indifference was slightly overdone, but the fancy did not linger—I was too busy surmising by what one of the many possible avenues that hapless mate had strolled out of existence. I was glad, if the suggestion of gladness over such a grim business be admissible, to have even this scanty information, since any temptation to taking my position at all carelessly was thereby effectually removed. Before coming on board I invested a large portion of my advance in two beautiful six-shooters and a good supply of ammunition, asking no questions of the joss-like Chinaman I bought them from as to how he became possessed of two U. S. Navy weapons and cartridges to match. I had, besides, a frightfully dangerous looking little kris, only about nine inches long altogether, but inlaid with gold, and tempered so that it would almost stab into iron. I picked it up on the beach at Hai-phong six months before, but had only thought of it as a handsome curio until now.