The chamber which was destined to be the scene of ourunforgettable experience was a charmingly feminine sitting-room,some fourteen or sixteen feet square. At the end of it, dividedby a curtain of red velvet, was a small apartment which formedthe Professor's dressing-room. This in turn opened into a largebedroom. The curtain was still hanging, but the boudoir anddressing-room could be taken as one chamber for the purposes ofour experiment. One door and the window frame had been plasteredround with varnished paper so as to be practically sealed. Abovethe other door, which opened on to the landing, there hung afanlight which could be drawn by a cord when some ventilationbecame absolutely necessary. A large shrub in a tub stood ineach corner.

"How to get rid of our excessive carbon dioxide without undulywasting our oxygen is a delicate and vital question," saidChallenger, looking round him after the five iron tubes had beenlaid side by side against the wall. "With longer time forpreparation I could have brought the whole concentrated force ofmy intelligence to bear more fully upon the problem, but as itis we must do what we can. The shrubs will be of some smallservice. Two of the oxygen tubes are ready to be turned on at aninstant's notice, so that we cannot be taken unawares. At thesame time, it would be well not to go far from the room, as thecrisis may be a sudden and urgent one."

There was a broad, low window opening out upon a balcony. Theview beyond was the same as that which we had already admiredfrom the study. Looking out, I could see no sign of disorderanywhere. There was a road curving down the side of the hill,under my very eyes. A cab from the station, one of thoseprehistoric survivals which are only to be found in our countryvillages, was toiling slowly up the hill. Lower down was a nursegirl wheeling a perambulator and leading a second child by thehand. The blue reeks of smoke from the cottages gave the wholewidespread landscape an air of settled order and homely comfort.Nowhere in the blue heaven or on the sunlit earth was there anyforeshadowing of a catastrophe. The harvesters were back in thefields once more and the golfers, in pairs and fours, were stillstreaming round the links. There was so strange a turmoil withinmy own head, and such a jangling of my overstrung nerves, thatthe indifference of those people was amazing.

"Those fellows don't seem to feel any ill effects," said I,pointing down at the links.

"Have you played golf?" asked Lord John.

"No, I have not."

"Well, young fellah, when you do you'll learn that once fairlyout on a round, it would take the crack of doom to stop a truegolfer. Halloa! There's that telephone-bell again."

From time to time during and after lunch the high, insistentring had summoned the Professor. He gave us the news as it camethrough to him in a few curt sentences. Such terrific items hadnever been registered in the world's history before. The greatshadow was creeping up from the south like a rising tide ofdeath. Egypt had gone through its delirium and was now comatose.Spain and Portugal, after a wild frenzy in which the Clericalsand the Anarchists had fought most desperately, were now fallensilent. No cable messages were received any longer from SouthAmerica. In North America the southern states, after someterrible racial rioting, had succumbed to the poison. North ofMaryland the effect was not yet marked, and in Canada it washardly perceptible. Belgium, Holland, and Denmark had each inturn been affected. Despairing messages were flashing from everyquarter to the great centres of learning, to the chemists andthe doctors of world-wide repute, imploring their advice. Theastronomers too were deluged with inquiries. Nothing could bedone. The thing was universal and beyond our human knowledge orcontrol. It was death--painless but inevitable--death for youngand old, for weak and strong, for rich and poor, without hope orpossibility of escape. Such was the news which, in scattered,distracted messages, the telephone had brought us. The greatcities already knew their fate and so far as we could gatherwere preparing to meet it with dignity and resignation. Yet herewere our golfers and laborers like the lambs who gambol underthe shadow of the knife. It seemed amazing. And yet how couldthey know? It had all come upon us in one giant stride. Whatwasthere in the morning paper to alarm them? And now it was butthree in the afternoon. Even as we looked some rumour seemed tohave spread, for we saw the reapers hurrying from the fields.Some of the golfers were returning to the club-house. They wererunning as if taking refuge from a shower. Their little caddiestrailed behind them. Others were continuing their game. Thenurse had turned and was pushing her perambulator hurriedly upthe hill again. I noticed that she had her hand to her brow. Thecab had stopped and the tired horse, with his head sunk to hisknees, was resting. Above there was a perfect summer sky--onehuge vault of unbroken blue, save for a few fleecy white cloudsover the distant downs. If the human race must die to-day, itwasat least upon a glorious death-bed. And yet all that gentleloveliness of nature made this terrific and wholesaledestruction the more pitiable and awful. Surely it was toogoodly a residence that we should be so swiftly, so ruthlessly,evicted from it!

But I have said that the telephone-bell had rung once more.Suddenly I heard Challenger's tremendous voice from the hall.

"Malone!" he cried. "You are wanted."I rushed down to the instrument. It was McArdle speaking fromLondon.

"That you, Mr. Malone?" cried his familiar voice. "Mr. Malone,there are terrible goings-on in London. For God's sake, see ifProfessor Challenger can suggest anything that can be done."

"He can suggest nothing, sir," I answered. "He regards thecrisis as universal and inevitable. We have some oxygen here,but it can only defer our fate for a few hours."

"Oxygen!" cried the agonized voice. "There is no time to getany. The office has been a perfect pandemonium ever since youleft in the morning. Now half of the staff are insensible. I amweighed down with heaviness myself. From my window I can see thepeople lying thick in Fleet Street. The traffic is all held up.Judging by the last telegrams, the whole world----"

His voice had been sinking, and suddenly stopped. An instantlater I heard through the telephone a muffled thud, as if hishead had fallen forward on the desk.

"Mr. McArdle!" I cried. "Mr. McArdle!"

There was no answer. I knew as I replaced the receiver that Ishould never hear his voice again.

At that instant, just as I took a step backwards from thetelephone, the thing was on us. It was as if we were bathers, upto our shoulders in water, who suddenly are submerged by arolling wave. An invisible hand seemed to have quietly closedround my throat and to be gently pressing the life from me. Iwas conscious of immense oppression upon my chest, greattightness within my head, a loud singing in my ears, and brightflashes before my eyes. I staggered to the balustrades of thestair. At the same moment, rushing and snorting like a woundedbuffalo, Challenger dashed past me, a terrible vision, withred-purple face, engorged eyes, and bristling hair. His littlewife, insensible to all appearance, was slung over his greatshoulder, and he blundered and thundered up the stair,scrambling and tripping, but carrying himself and her throughsheer will-force through that mephitic atmosphere to the havenof temporary safety. At the sight of his effort I too rushed upthe steps, clambering, falling, clutching at the rail, until Itumbled half senseless upon by face on the upper landing. LordJohn's fingers of steel were in the collar of my coat, and amoment later I was stretched upon my back, unable to speak ormove, on the boudoir carpet. The woman lay beside me, andSummerlee was bunched in a chair by the window, his head nearlytouching his knees. As in a dream I saw Challenger, like amonstrous beetle, crawling slowly across the floor, and a momentlater I heard the gentle hissing of the escaping oxygen.Challenger breathed two or three times with enormous gulps, hislungs roaring as he drew in the vital gas.

"It works!" he cried exultantly. "My reasoning has beenjustified!" He was up on his feet again, alert and strong. Witha tube in his hand he rushed over to his wife and held it to herface. In a few seconds she moaned, stirred, and sat up. Heturned to me, and I felt the tide of life stealing warmlythrough my arteries. My reason told me that it was but a littlerespite, and yet, carelessly as we talk of its value, every hourof existence now seemed an inestimable thing. Never have I knownsuch a thrill of sensuous joy as came with that freshet of life.The weight fell away from my lungs, the band loosened from mybrow, a sweet feeling of peace and gentle, languid comfort stoleover me. I lay watching Summerlee revive under the same remedy,and finally Lord John took his turn. He sprang to his feet andgave me a hand to rise, while Challenger picked up his wife andlaid her on the settee.

"Oh, George, I am so sorry you brought me back," she said,holding him by the hand. "The door of death is indeed, as yousaid, hung with beautiful, shimmering curtains; for, once thechoking feeling had passed, it was all unspeakably soothing andbeautiful. Why have you dragged me back?"

"Because I wish that we make the passage together. We have beentogether so many years. It would be sad to fall apart at thesupreme moment."

For a moment in his tender voice I caught a glimpse of a newChallenger, something very far from the bullying, ranting,arrogant man who had alternately amazed and offended hisgeneration. Here in the shadow of death was the innermostChallenger, the man who had won and held a woman's love.Suddenly his mood changed and he was our strong captain onceagain.

"Alone of all mankind I saw and foretold this catastrophe," saidhe with a ring of exultation and scientific triumph in hisvoice. "As to you, my good Summerlee, I trust your last doubtshave been resolved as to the meaning of the blurring of thelines in the spectrum and that you will no longer contend thatmy letter in the Times was based upon a delusion."

For once our pugnacious colleague was deaf to a challenge. Hecould but sit gasping and stretching his long, thin limbs, as ifto assure himself that he was still really upon this planet.Challenger walked across to the oxygen tube, and the sound ofthe loud hissing fell away till it was the most gentlesibilation.

"We must husband our supply of the gas," said he. "Theatmosphere of the room is now strongly hyperoxygenated, and Itake it that none of us feel any distressing symptoms. We canonly determine by actual experiments what amount added to theair will serve to neutralize the poison. Let us see how thatwill do."

We sat in silent nervous tension for five minutes or more,observing our own sensations. I had just begun to fancy that Ifelt the constriction round my temples again when Mrs.Challenger called out from the sofa that she was fainting. Herhusband turned on more gas.

"In pre-scientific days," said he, "they used to keep a whitemouse in every submarine, as its more delicate organization gavesigns of a vicious atmosphere before it was perceived by thesailors. You, my dear, will be our white mouse. I have nowincreased the supply and you are better."

"Yes, I am better."

"Possibly we have hit upon the correct mixture. When we haveascertained exactly how little will serve we shall be able tocompute how long we shall be able to exist. Unfortunately, inresuscitating ourselves we have already consumed a considerableproportion of this first tube."

"Does it matter?" asked Lord John, who was standing with hishands in his pockets close to the window. "If we have to go,what is the use of holdin' on? You don't suppose there's anychance for us?"

Challenger smiled and shook his head.

"Well, then, don't you think there is more dignity in takin' thejump and not waitin' to he pushed in? If it must be so, I'm forsayin' our prayers, turnin' off the gas, and openin' the window."

"Why not?" said the lady bravely. "Surely, George, Lord John isright and it is better so."

"I most strongly object," cried Summerlee in a querulous voice."When we must die let us by all means die, but to deliberatelyanticipate death seems to me to be a foolish and unjustifiableaction."

"What does our young friend say to it?" asked Challenger.

"I think we should see it to the end."

"And I am strongly of the same opinion," said he.

"Then, George, if you say so, I think so too," cried the lady.

"Well, well, I'm only puttin' it as an argument," said LordJohn. "If you all want to see it through I am with you. It'sdooced interestin', and no mistake about that. I've had my shareof adventures in my life, and as many thrills as most folk, butI'm endin' on my top note."

"Granting the continuity of life," said Challenger.

"A large assumption!" cried Summerlee. Challenger stared at himin silent reproof.

"Granting the continuity of life," said he, in his most didacticmanner, "none of us can predicate what opportunities ofobservation one may have from what we may call the spirit planeto the plane of matter. It surely must be evident to the mostobtuse person" (here he glared a Summerlee) "that it is while weare ourselves material that we are most fitted to watch and forma judgment upon material phenomena. Therefore it is only bykeeping alive for these few extra hours that we can hope tocarry on with us to some future existence a clear conception ofthe most stupendous event that the world, or the universe so faras we know it, has ever encountered. To me it would seem adeplorable thing that we should in any way curtail by so much asa minute so wonderful an experience."

"I am strongly of the same opinion," cried Summerlee.

"Carried without a division," said Lord John. "By George, thatpoor devil of a chauffeur of yours down in the yard has made hislast journey. No use makin' a sally and bringin' him in?"

"It would be absolute madness," cried Summerlee.

"Well, I suppose it would," said Lord John. "It couldn't helphimand would scatter our gas all over the house, even if we ever gotback alive. My word, look at the little birds under the trees!"

We drew four chairs up to the long, low window, the lady stillresting with closed eyes upon the settee. I remember that themonstrous and grotesque idea crossed my mind--the illusion mayhave been heightened by the heavy stuffiness of the air which wewere breathing--that we were in four front seats of the stallsat the last act of the drama of the world.

In the immediate foreground, beneath our very eyes, was thesmall yard with the half-cleaned motor-car standing in it.Austin, the chauffeur, had received his final notice at last, forhe was sprawling beside the wheel, with a great black bruiseupon his forehead where it had struck the step or mud-guard infalling. He still held in his hand the nozzle of the hose withwhich he had been washing down his machine. A couple of smallplane trees stood in the corner of the yard, and underneath themlay several pathetic little balls of fluffy feathers, with tinyfeet uplifted. The sweep of death's scythe had includedeverything, great and small, within its swath.

Over the wall of the yard we looked down upon the winding road,which led to the station. A group of the reapers whom we hadseen running from the fields were lying all pell-mell, theirbodies crossing each other, at the bottom of it. Farther up, thenurse-girl lay with her head and shoulders propped against theslope of the grassy bank. She had taken the baby from theperambulator, and it was a motionless bundle of wraps in herarms. Close behind her a tiny patch upon the roadside showedwhere the little boy was stretched. Still nearer to us was thedead cab-horse, kneeling between the shafts. The old driver washanging over the splash-board like some grotesque scarecrow, hisarms dangling absurdly in front of him. Through the window wecould dimly discern that a young man was seated inside. The doorwasswinging open and his hand was grasping the handle, as if he hadattempted to leap forth at the last instant. In the middledistance lay the golf links, dotted as they had been in themorning with the dark figures of the golfers, lying motionlessupon the grass of the course or among the heather which skirtedit. On one particular green there were eight bodies stretchedwhere a foursome with its caddies had held to their game to thelast. No bird flew in the blue vault of heaven, no man or beastmoved upon the vast countryside which lay before us. The eveningsun shone its peaceful radiance across it, but there broodedover it all the stillness and the silence of universal death--adeath in which we were so soon to join. At the present instantthat one frail sheet of glass, by holding in the extra oxygenwhich counteracted the poisoned ether, shut us off from the fateof all our kind. For a few short hours the knowledge andforesight of one man could preserve our little oasis of life inthe vast desert of death and save us from participation in thecommon catastrophe. Then the gas would run low, we too shouldlie gasping upon that cherry-coloured boudoir carpet, and thefate of the human race and of all earthly life would becomplete. For a long time, in a mood which was too solemn forspeech, we looked out at the tragic world.

"There is a house on fire," said Challenger at last, pointing toa column of smoke which rose above the trees. "There will, Iexpect, be many such--possibly whole cities in flames--when weconsider how many folk may have dropped with lights in theirhands. The fact of combustion is in itself enough to show thatthe proportion of oxygen in the atmosphere is normal and that itis the ether which is at fault. Ah, there you see another blazeon the top of Crowborough Hill. It is the golf clubhouse, or Iam mistaken. There is the church clock chiming the hour. Itwould interest our philosophers to know that man-made mechanismshas survived the race who made it."

"By George!" cried Lord John, rising excitedly from his chair."What's that puff of smoke? It's a train."

We heard the roar of it, and presently it came flying intosight, going at what seemed to me to be a prodigious speed.Whence it had come, or how far, we had no means of knowing. Onlyby some miracle of luck could it have gone any distance. But nowwe were to see the terrific end of its career. A train of coaltrucks stood motionless upon the line. We held our breath as theexpress roared along the same track. The crash was horrible.Engine and carriages piled themselves into a hill of splinteredwood and twisted iron. Red spurts of flame flickered up from thewreckage until it was all ablaze. For half an hour we sat withhardly a word, stunned by the stupendous sight.

"Poor, poor people!" cried Mrs. Challenger at last, clingingwith a whimper to her husband's arm.

"My dear, the passengers on that train were no more animate thanthe coals into which they crashed or the carbon which they havenow become," said Challenger, stroking her hand soothingly. "Itwas a train of the living when it left Victoria, but it wasdriven and freighted by the dead long before it reached itsfate."

"All over the world the same thing must be going on," said I asa vision of strange happenings rose before me. "Think of theships at sea--how they will steam on and on, until the furnacesdie down or until they run full tilt upon some beach. Thesailing ships too--how they will back and fill with their cargoesof dead sailors, while their timbers rot and their joints leak,till one by one they sink below the surface. Perhaps a centuryhence the Atlantic may still be dotted with the old driftingderelicts."

"And the folk in the coal-mines," said Summerlee with a dismalchuckle. "If ever geologists should by any chance live uponearth again they will have some strange theories of theexistence of man in carboniferous strata."

"I don't profess to know about such things," remarked Lord John,"but it seems to me the earth will be `To let, empty,' afterthis. When once our human crowd is wiped off it, how will itever get on again?"

"The world was empty before," Challenger answered gravely."Under laws which in their inception are beyond and above us, itbecame peopled. Why may the same process not happen again?"

"My dear Challenger, you can't mean that?"

"I am not in the habit, Professor Summerlee, of saying thingswhich I do not mean. The observation is trivial." Out went thebeard and down came the eyelids.

"Well, you lived an obstinate dogmatist, and you mean to dieone," said Summerlee sourly.

"And you, sir, have lived an unimaginative obstructionist andnever can hope now to emerge from it."

"Your worst critics will never accuse you of lackingimagination," Summerlee retorted.

"Upon my word!" said Lord John. "It would be like you if youused up our last gasp of oxygen in abusing each other. What canit matter whether folk come back or not? It surely won't be inour time." "In that remark, sir, you betray your own verypronounced limitations," said Challenger severely. "The truescientific mind is not to be tied down by its own conditions oftime and space. It builds itself an observatory erected upon theborder line of present, which separates the infinite past fromthe infinite future. From this sure post it makes its sallieseven to the beginning and to the end of all things. As to death,the scientific mind dies at its post working in normal andmethodic fashion to the end. It disregards so petty a thing asits own physical dissolution as completely as it does all otherlimitations upon the plane of matter. Am I right, ProfessorSummerlee?"

Summerlee grumbled an ungracious assent.

"With certain reservations, I agree," said he.

"The ideal scientific mind," continued Challenger--"I put it inthe third person rather than appear to be tooself-complacent--the ideal scientific mind should be capable ofthinking out a point of abstract knowledge in the intervalbetween its owner falling from a balloon and reaching the earth.Men of this strong fibre are needed to form the conquerors ofnature and the bodyguard of truth."

"It strikes me nature's on top this time," said Lord John,looking out of the window. "I've read some leadin' articlesabout you gentlemen controllin' her, but she's gettin' a bit ofher own back."

"It is but a temporary setback," said Challenger withconviction. "A few million years, what are they in the greatcycle of time? The vegetable world has, as you can see,survived. Look at the leaves of that plane tree. The birds aredead, but the plant flourishes. From this vegetable life in pondand in marsh will come, in time, the tiny crawling microscopicslugs which are the pioneers of that great army of life in whichfor the instant we five have the extraordinary duty of serving asrear guard. Once the lowest form of life has established itself,the final advent of man is as certain as the growth of the oakfrom the acorn. The old circle will swing round once more."

"But the poison?" I asked. "Will that not nip life in the bud?"

"The poison may be a mere stratum or layer in the ether--amephitic Gulf Stream across that mighty ocean in which we float.Or tolerance may be established and life accommodate itself toa new condition. The mere fact that with a comparatively smallhyperoxygenation of our blood we can hold out against it issurely a proof in itself that no very great change would beneeded to enable animal life to endure it."

The smoking house beyond the trees had burst into flames. Wecould see the high tongues of fire shooting up into the air.

"It's pretty awful," muttered Lord John, more impressed than Ihad ever seen him.

"Well, after all, what does it matter?" I remarked. "The worldis dead. Cremation is surely the best burial."

"It would shorten us up if this house went ablaze."

"I foresaw the danger," said Challenger, "and asked my wife toguard against it."

"Everything is quite safe, dear. But my head begins to throbagain. What a dreadful atmosphere!"

"We must change it," said Challenger. He bent over his cylinderof oxygen.

"It's nearly empty," said he. "It has lasted us some three and ahalf hours. It is now close on eight o'cloek. We shall getthroughthe night comfortably. I should expect the end about nineo'clock to-morrow morning. We shall see one sunrise, which shallbe all our own."

He turned on his second tube and opened for half a minute thefanlight over the door. Then as the air became perceptiblybetter, but our own symptoms more acute, he closed it once again.

"By the way," said he, "man does not live upon oxygen alone.It's dinner time and over. I assure you, gentlemen, that when Iinvited you to my home and to what I had hoped would be aninteresting reunion, I had intended that my kitchen shouldjustify itself. However, we must do what we can. I am sure thatyou will agree with me that it would be folly to consume our airtoo rapidly by lighting an oil-stove. I have some smallprovisionof cold meats, bread, and pickles which, with a couple ofbottles of claret, may serve our turn. Thank you, my dear--nowas ever you are the queen of managers."

It was indeed wonderful how, with the self-respect and sense ofpropriety of the British housekeeper, the lady had within a fewminutes adorned the central table with a snow-white cloth, laidthe napkins upon it, and set forth the simple meal with all theelegance of civilization, including an electric torch lamp inthe centre. Wonderful also was it to find that our appetiteswereravenous.

"It is the measure of our emotion," said Challenger with thatair of condescension with which he brought his scientific mindto the explanation of humble facts. "We have gone through agreat crisis. That means molecular disturbance. That in turnmeans the need for repair. Great sorrow or great joy shouldbring intense hunger--not abstinence from food, as our novelistswill have it."

"That's why the country folk have great feasts at funerals," Ihazarded.

"Exactly. Our young friend has hit upon an excellentillustration. Let me give you another slice of tongue."

"The same with savages," said Lord John, cutting away at thebeef. "I've seen them buryin' a chief up the Aruwimi River, andthey ate a hippo that must have weighed as much as a tribe.There are some of them down New Guinea way that eat thelate-lamented himself, just by way of a last tidy up. Well, ofall the funeral feasts on this earth, I suppose the one we aretakin' is the queerest."

"The strange thing is," said Mrs. Challenger, "that I find itimpossible to feel grief for those who are gone. There are myfather and mother at Bedford. I know that they are dead, and yetin this tremendous universal tragedy I can feel no sharp sorrowfor any individuals, even for them."

"And my old mother in her cottage in Ireland," said I. "I cansee her in my mind's eye, with her shawl and her lace cap, lyingback with closed eyes in the old high-backed chair near thewindow, her glasses and her book beside her. Why should I mourn.her? She has passed and I am passing, and I may be nearer her insome other life than England is to Ireland. Yet I grieve tothink that that dear body is no more."

"As to the body," remarked Challenger, "we do not mourn over theparings of our nails nor the cut locks of our hair, though theywere once part of ourselves. Neither does a one-legged man yearnsentimentally over his missing member. The physical body hasrather been a source of pain and fatigue to us. It is theconstant index of our limitations. Why then should we worryabout its detachment from our psychical selves?"

"If they can indeed be detached," Summerlee grumbled. "But,anyhow, universal death is dreadful."

"As I have already explained," said Challenger, "a universaldeath must in its nature be far less terrible than a isolatedone."

"Same in a battle," remarked Lord John. "If you saw a single manlying on that floor with his chest knocked in and a hole in hisface it would turn you sick. But I've seen ten thousand on theirbacks in the Soudan, and it gave me no such feelin', for when youare makin' history the life of any man is too small a thing toworry over. When a thousand million pass over together, same ashappened to-day, you can't pick your own partic'lar out of thecrowd."

"I wish it were well over with us," said the lady wistfully."Oh, George, I am so frightened."

"You'll be the bravest of us all, little lady, when the timecomes. I've been a blusterous old husband to you, dear, butyou'll just bear in mind that G. E. C. is as he was made andcouldn't help himself. After all, you wouldn't have had anyoneelse?"

"No one in the whole wide world, dear," said she, and put herarms round his bull neck. We three walked to the window andstood amazed at the sight which met our eyes.

Darkness had fallen and the dead world was shrouded in gloom.But right across the southern horizon was one long vivid scarletstreak, waxing and waning in vivid pulses of life, leapingsuddenly to a crimson zenith and then dying down to a glowingline of fire.

"Lewes is ablaze!"

"No, it is Brighton which is burning," said Challenger, steppingacross to join us. "You can see the curved back of the downsagainst the glow. That fire is miles on the farther side of it.The whole town must be alight."

There were several red glares at different points, and the pileof DEBRIS upon the railway line was still smoldering darkly,but they all seemed mere pin-points of light compared to thatmonstrous conflagration throbbing beyond the hills. What copy itwould have made for the Gazette! Had ever a journalist such anopening and so little chance of using it--the scoop of scoops,and no one to appreciate it? And then, suddenly, the oldinstinct of recording came over me. If these men of sciencecould be so true to their life's work to the very end, whyshould not I, in my humble way, be as constant? No human eyemight ever rest upon what I had done. But the long night had tobe passed somehow, and for me at least, sleep seemed to be outof the question. My notes would help to pass the weary hours andto occupy my thoughts. Thus it is that now I have before me thenotebook with its scribbled pages, written confusedly upon myknee in the dim, waning light of our one electric torch. Had Ithe literary touch, they might have been worthy of the occasion,As it is, they may still serve to bring to other minds thelong-drawn emotions and tremors of that awful night.