The twentieth of February saw the last morsel of food eaten.  I prefer to skip the details of much that happened in the next eight days.  I shall touch only on the incidents that serve to show what manner of men were my companions.  We had starved so long, that we had no reserves of strength on which to draw when the food utterly ceased, and we grew weaker with great rapidity.

On February twenty-fourth we calmly talked the situation over.  We were three stout-spirited men, full of life and toughness, and we did not want to die.  No one of us would volunteer to sacrifice himself for the other two.  But we agreed on three things:  we must have food; we must decide the matter by casting lots; and we would cast the lots next morning if there were no wind.

Next morning there was wind, not much of it, but fair, so that we were able to log a sluggish two knots on our northerly course.  The mornings of the twenty-sixth and twenty-seventh found us with a similar breeze.  We were fearfully weak, but we abided by our decision and continued to sail.

But with the morning of the twenty-eighth we knew the time was come.  The longboat rolled drearily on an empty, windless sea, and the stagnant, overcast sky gave no promise of any breeze.  I cut three pieces of cloth, all of a size, from my jacket.  In the ravel of one of these pieces was a bit of brown thread.  Whoever drew this lost.  I then put the three lots into my hat, covering it with Captain Nicholl’s hat.

All was ready, but we delayed for a time while each prayed silently and long, for we knew that we were leaving the decision to God.  I was not unaware of my own honesty and worth; but I was equally aware of the honesty and worth of my companions, so that it perplexed me how God could decide so fine-balanced and delicate a matter.

The captain, as was his right and due, drew first.  After his hand was in the hat he delayed for sometime with closed eyes, his lips moving a last prayer.  And he drew a blank.  This was right—­a true decision I could not but admit to myself; for Captain Nicholl’s life was largely known to me and I knew him to be honest, upright, and God-fearing.

Remained the surgeon and me.  It was one or the other, and, according to ship’s rating, it was his due to draw next.  Again we prayed.  As I prayed I strove to quest back in my life and cast a hurried tally-sheet of my own worth and unworth.

I held the hat on my knees with Captain Nicholl’s hat over it.  The surgeon thrust in his hand and fumbled about for some time, while I wondered whether the feel of that one brown thread could be detected from the rest of the ravel.

At last he withdrew his hand.  The brown thread was in his piece of cloth.  I was instantly very humble and very grateful for God’s blessing thus extended to me; and I resolved to keep more faithfully than ever all of His commandments.  The next moment I could not help but feel that the surgeon and the captain were pledged to each other by closer ties of position and intercourse than with me, and that they were in a measure disappointed with the outcome.  And close with that thought ran the conviction that they were such true men that the outcome would not interfere with the plan arranged.