He canvassed the poop. No high pedestals on which a man (or a great ape) might perch, no protective armor of any description to foil the attack of the rats. Here he stood, alone, armed with a broadsword and a dagger, a helmet and a golden sigil. There was but a single chance. He might squat on the bulwarks at the very stern, for they were high and would give him the advantage of being a little above his squealing enemies. He leaped and balanced and squatted, and his naked iron broadsword hung down between his bent knees as he awaited their first move. This was not long in coming. The poop was the only part of the ship which was not being ravaged by fire. The rats headed for its temporary safety. As they poured over it, a repulsive and horrible crew, snapping and snarling at one another, their fangs yellow as amber slivers, their hides mangy and often showing the first signs of plague, the leaders spied Godwin roosting unhappily on the rail. They halted, considered, twitched their whiskers, and then made for him. He was meat. The first rank charged in and were slain eight at a blow, by the sweeping sword. The second rank fared likewise. The rats drew back and stared beadily at him. He could fairly hear their odious, menacing thoughts. He waited. A gigantic rodent, half its fur gone in some hideous battle below decks, came flying at him. The perfect reflexes of the gorilla flicked the sword out and spitted the beast through the guts. It hung on the sword, squirming and piping weakly, as Godwin whipped the blade back and forth and clove the small skulls of a dozen more. A myriad of the grisly horde came tumbling up to the poop deck. Godwin was now mangling and mutilating constantly, as more rats poured upon him. Some of the devils were already feasting on their defunct cousins. And so, for minutes that dragged like weeks, Godwin of England fought off the rats, and waited without hope for the inevitable end, when even his mighty muscles should grow weary and his eye become slow, and at last they should reach him. A close-packed group of them attacked him from the right, and some of them even leaped upon the rail and came at him. He flailed his sword frantically into the brown of them, sending them slithering along the deck, knocking them into the sea, or spoiling them where they stood by messy divisions and squashings. Then a legion came from the left, and he leaped up to his feet and balanced precariously on the bulwarks as he bent and swiped back and forth. * * * * * The closest any of them had come yet was in this moment, when three great bullies of rats, all fat and evil and ugly, leaped upon his swaying leathern scabbard and clung there. They might have crept up it and bitten him before he could slay them, except for the fortunate stab of the late Saracen fencer, which had all but severed his sword belt. The last few strands parted now, and the sheath fell to the deck, carrying rats and belt with it.