And I saw that something restraining, one of those human secrets that baffle probability, had come into play there. I looked at them with a swift quickening of interest⁠—not because it occurred to me I might be eaten by them before very long, though I own to you that just then I perceived⁠—in a new light, as it were⁠—how unwholesome the pilgrims looked, and I hoped, yes, I positively hoped, that my aspect was not so⁠—what shall I say?⁠—so⁠—unappetizing: a touch of fantastic vanity which fitted well with the dream-sensation that pervaded all my days at that time. Perhaps I had a little fever, too. One can’t live with one’s finger everlastingly on one’s pulse. I had often ‘a little fever,’ or a little touch of other things⁠—the playful paw-strokes of the wilderness, the preliminary trifling before the more serious onslaught which came in due course. Yes; I looked at them as you would on any human being, with a curiosity of their impulses, motives, capacities, weaknesses, when brought to the test of an inexorable physical necessity. Restraint! What possible restraint? Was it superstition, disgust, patience, fear⁠—or some kind of primitive honour?