But I will not endanger any one else; all I
want is the use of your canoe."
"What! brave this storm in a wretched seal-skin cockle-shell like
that?"
"Would it not be offending Providence," hazarded Mary Wolston, "for
one of God's creatures to abandon himself to certain death?"
"It would, indeed," added Mrs. Wolston; "true courage consists in
facing danger when it is inevitable, but not in uselessly imperiling
one's life; there stops courage, and temerity begins."
"If it is not pride or folly. I do not mean that with reference to
you, Willis," hastily added Wolston; "I know that you are open as day,
and that all your impulses arise from the heart."
"That is all very fine--but I must act; let me have the canoe. I want
the canoe: that is my idea."
"Having lived fifteen years cut off from society," gravely observed
Becker, "it may be that I have forgotten some of the laws it imposes;
nevertheless, I declare upon my honor and conscience--"
"Let me have the canoe, otherwise I must swim to the ship."
"I declare," continued Becker, "that Willis exaggerates the
requirements of his duty. There are stronger forces to which the human
will must yield. It is one thing to desert one's post in the hour of
danger, and another to have come on shore at the express desire of a
superior officer, when the weather was fine, and nothing presaged a
storm.
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