For many days the ship followed the coast, followed it far off, like the timid disciple. There were high unreasonable islands, suddenly before the unsuspecting ship. The islands sustained an illusion of life on their shores; they sent their hopes out into the sea in little fishing boats. Once there was a boat quite near. In it one man smoothed his long unbound hair into a queue; another played on a stringed instrument and whined a song; another indolently directed the boat towards the bristling stockade of floating poles that marked their net. But it must all have been faery. No community could really live such a secret life, a life so full of things that would never be known. One day passengers came on board in mid-sea, a great crowd of birds, land-birds who knew nothing of the dangerous skies over the sea. Hawks and woodpeckers, sparrows and doves and little tits and finches stood about the rigging pretending not to see one another. The seagulls laughed at them. The land-birds felt uneasy standing in these strange, black, even trees, they were too much puzzled to be very much afraid of men. A red and green bird walked about near Edward, hoping that it would find a worm somewhere. Whenever Edward spoke to it, it pulled itself self-consciously together but did not fly away. A Chinese sailor caught a sparrowhawk and tied it to the capstan by the leg. Wei-hai-wei seemed to be the arranged destination of these passengers. Like a Cook’s Conducted Tour they all disembarked together in the most businesslike way. Only the hawk, tied by the leg to the capstan, was left behind looking sullenly across at the sullen dark battleships that peered out of the harbour. The three officers of the ship left Edward a great deal alone. The captain was an Irishman, a fat, fair man with great, serene, grey eyes. He had once been, he told Edward pointedly, a slave to drink; he had an idea that Edward was similarly bound. He thought he could haul Edward’s soul to safety on a thin string of sentimental reminders ... “mother, waiting at home ... grey hairs in sorrow to the grave ... England needs strong sane men now ... devil’s brew ... I know, me lad, I’ve been through hell on account of it....” “Hell’s the word,” said Edward placidly, basking in the light of the captain’s earnest missionary interest. The captain would not allow Edward to drink, either in the ship or at Chefoo—their only port of call. “You don’t know China,” said the captain. “You youngsters simply don’t know how to behave in China. In London now, two or three whiskies and sodas ... no harm at all. But in China—I tell you I’ve seen men arrive in Shanghai with babies’ complexions ... and five years after ... yellow as a daffodil, bent, malarial, only fit for nursing homes.” Edward hoped that he would look only fit for a nursing home when he met Emily. Then she would think, “How he has suffered. How I have made him suffer.”