"Have a care, 211," muttered the galérien next to him—"have a care. If we escape the English ship with life, your existence will be a greater hell than before for those words!"
211 threw his matted hair back from his eyes with a jerk of his head—his hands he could not release from the oar—and looked at his neighbour. He was a man burnt black with the sun, thin, emaciated, and half starved. On his shoulders, where they caught hourly the cords of the comite's whip, great scars, and livid—as well as raw—wounds; yet still young and with handsome features.
"We shall not escape," he replied. "She gains on us each moment. See!" and as their faces were naturally directed aft of the galley, they could observe, through the great scuttle by the poops, the frigate rising larger each instant behind them.
"Better even this than death," said the other. "We know where we are now, at least—who knows where we shall be? Hist! he returns."
Again the comite ran along the gangway, dealing out more blows and curses, each of these men getting their share. Then, when the hoarse, foul voice of the overseer was heard at the other end of the hundred and eighty feet long galère Grand Réale, No. 211 answered him.
"No," he said, "death is better than this. It is peace at least."
"You seek it—hope for it?"
"Ay," No. 211 replied, "pray for it. Hourly!"
"What was your crime?" his companion asked. They had been chained together for two days only, the slave whose place the questioner now filled having been beaten to death, and this, in the excitement of the impending attack, was their first opportunity of conversing.
"Nothing."