The moist breezes were trembling slowly over the face of the calm sea when the young fisherman came upon the winding shore, stumbling in his steps like a drunkard. He stood gazing closely at the sea, as though it had vanished from his sight. Then upon his pensive features appeared a dark cloud in which surged various phantoms, all of
them expressing a single meaning: mockery of this heavy life... this exceedingly heavy life.
He has been starving for two whole days; O what luck, O what fate!!
This is dreadful, no doubt of it; but it is now a fact — so what is to be done??
And these bewildered words kept turning on his tongue as they turn in the mouth of a madman who knows not what he says.
Life appeared to his eyes in a fleeting gleam, for all its darknesses,
when — at the last moment — he resolved upon something within himself.
What harm would it do him if he cast himself into this merciful deep instead of this net of his?
Would he not, in doing so, hold more firmly to his dignity than he does now, lowering it every day to the humiliation of every kind of bitter begging, which makes his brow drip with sweat and fills his
eyes with brokenness?!
And there appeared to him on the surface of the waters, between the still ebb and flow, those grim faces — the faces of his creditors, looking at him askance, and on the lips of each of them words...
And with a mad movement in which appeared the pride of one jealous of his dignity, he pulled the rope of the net toward him, to cast himself in its place.
Is not death dearer to him than this... foolish, insipid life?
Yes indeed... Then what remains for him to do! Nothing, nothing at all!! And he pulled the rope toward him a second time, while a strong voice rising from the depths of his soul opposed him, saying: But you, man, are still young, and the paths before you are still wide of side, gilded at their edges.
But he cut that voice off violently, saying:
Yes, I am young; I know that well. But what is the worth of this dry youth that withers and perishes, waiting without ever attaining its hopes!!
What is the worth of this youth that stands with bowed head, waiting for the black morsel!
It spoke to him a speech in which
was his manhood... and his heart... and the cry of his soul. Then he cast his net, and it went sinking slowly to the bottom until—