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Douglas, Norman, 1868-1952

"South Wind"

A Revelation drew nigh. It just came to
him.
The fishes.
It was a dying gleam of intelligence, his last inspired thought, his
swan-song. How else could the fishes live save in the water? All these
long years he had remained ignorant of the truth. Ah, if only his
disciples were at hand, to jot it down into that GOLDEN BOOK!
But why--why must the fishes live in water? And why so much water for so
few fishes? Why cannot fishes live on land? Then everybody would be
satisfied. Inscrutable are the ways of God. . . .
And his glazed eye moved wearily from that disquieting expanse of blue
along the wall of his chamber which had once been white and was now
scrawled over with obscene jests and drawings, product of the leisure
hours of generations of prisoners. The writing, like all writing, was
unintelligible to him. But some of the artistic efforts left little to
the imagination. He was saddened, less by homely pictures than by the
unfamiliar script. He had always distrusted the written word.


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