“And are you on the side of the English, Toni?  You, a man of advanced ideas?...”

The pilot scratched his beard with an expression of perplexity, searching for the elusive words.  He knew what he ought to say.  He had read it in the writings of gentlemen who knew quite as much as his captain; besides, he had thought a great deal about this matter in his solitary pacing on the bridge.

“I am where I ought to be.  I am with France....”

He expressed this thought sluggishly, with stutterings and half-formed words.  France was the country of the great Revolution, and for that reason he considered it as something to which he belonged, uniting its faith with that of his own person.

“And I do not need to say more.  As to England....”

Here he made a pause like one who rests and gathers all his forces together for a difficult leap.

“There always has to be one nation on top,” he continued.  “We hardly amount to anything at present and, according to what I have read, Spain was once mistress of the entire world for a century and a half.  Once we were everywhere; now we are in the soup.  Then came France’s turn.  Now it is England’s....  It doesn’t bother me that one nation places itself above the rest.  The thing that interests me is what that nation represents,—­the fashion it, will set.”

Ferragut was concentrating his attention in order to comprehend what Toni wished to say.

“If England triumphs,” the pilot continued, “Liberty will be the fashion.  What does their haughtiness amount to with me, if there always has to be one dominating Nation?...  The nations will surely copy the victor....  England, so they say, is really a republic that prefers to pay for the luxury of a king for its grand ceremonials.  With her, peace would be inevitable, the government managed by the people, the disappearance of the great armies, the true civilization.  If Germany triumphs, we shall live as though we were in barracks.  Militarism will govern everything.  We shall bring up our children, not that they may enjoy life, but that they may become soldiers and go forth to kill from their very youth.  Might as the only Right, that is the German method,—­a return to barbarous times under the mask of civilization.”

He was silent an instant, as though mentally recapitulating all that he had said in order to convince himself that he had not left any forgotten idea in the corners of his cranium.  Again he struck himself on the breast.  Yes, he was where he ought to be, and it was impossible for him to obey his captain.

“I am a Republican!...  I am a Republican!” he repeated energetically, as though having said that, there was nothing more to add.

Ferragut, not knowing how to answer this simple and solid enthusiasm, gave way to his temper.

“Get out, you brute!...  I don’t want to see you again, ungrateful wretch!  I shall do the thing alone; I don’t need you.  It is enough for me to take my boat where it pleases me and to follow out my own pleasure.  Be off with all the old lies with which you have crammed your cranium....  You blockhead!”