soon impressed him so vividly as to blot out everything of his shadowy
world, but of a night-time, in a darkened room, he could still see the
white-splashed rocks of the island, and the clumsy penguins staggering to
and fro. But even these grew fainter and fainter, and, at last, soon after
he married my sister, he saw them for the last time.


V.

And now to tell of the queerest thing of all. About two years after his
cure I dined with the Davidsons, and after dinner a man named Atkins
called in. He is a lieutenant in the Royal Navy, and a pleasant, talkative
man. He was on friendly terms with my brother-in-law, and was soon on
friendly terms with me. It came out that he was engaged to Davidson's
cousin, and incidentally he took out a kind of pocket photograph case to
show us a new rendering of his _fiancée_. "And, by-the-by," said he,
"here's the old _Fulmar_."

Davidson looked at it casually. Then suddenly his face lit up. "Good
heavens!" said he. "I could almost swear----"

"What?" said Atkins.

"That I had seen that ship before."

"Don't see how you can have. She hasn't been out of the South Seas for six
years, and before then----"

"But," began Davidson, and then, "Yes--that's the ship I dreamt of; I'm
sure that's the ship I dreamt of. She was standing off an island that