What more could be said or done?
In the meantime light was swiftly rushing up the sky and waking all
things to life. A flock of seagulls came from the depth of the night and
wheeled about the yacht, their shrill screams strangely softened in the
morning air. At the sound of them Julius roused himself, and raised
himself on his elbow to watch their beautiful evolutions. As he watched,
one and another swooped gracefully to the water, and hanging there an
instant, rose with a fish and flew away. Julius flung himself again on
his face.
"O God!" he cried. "Is it not horrible? Even on such a beautiful day as
this death wakes as early as life! Devouring death is ushered in by the
dawn, hand in hand with generous life! Awful, devilish Nature! that
makes all creatures full of beauty and delight, and then condemns them
to live upon each other! Nature is the sphinx: she appears soft and
gentle and more lovely than heart can bear, but if you look closer, you
see she is a creature with claws and teeth that rend and devour! I
thought, fool that I was! that I had found the secret to solve her
riddle! But it was an empty hope, a vain imagination.
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