The ship splintered, and the captain called his men to the few boats they had, lowering them into the sea. A futile attempt. We sank the boats as soon as they cleared the wreckage. The captain saw his men, calling out in the sea, took up a flagon of wine, and, head hung, sat with his back to the wheel of the ship and waited to die.

The morning came, dawn creeping over the sea guided by those chariots of fire, and to our surprise, there was a man still alive in the sea, clinging to a board and kicking, exhausted, toward our home. The refusal of human beings to die in the face of insurmountable evidence suggesting it as the wisest course of action always astounded me.