It
was immense; it seemed to grow gradually larger, as his body day by
day shrank a little more, while we looked. It was the only thing about
him--of him--that gave the impression of durability and vigour. It lived
within him with an unquenchable life. It spoke through the eternal pout
of his black lips; it looked at us through the impertinent mournfulness
of his languid and enormous stare. We watched him intently. He seemed
unwilling to move, as if distrustful of his own solidity. The slightest
gesture must have disclosed to him (it could not surely be otherwise)
his bodily weakness, and caused a pang of mental suffering. He was chary
of movements. He lay stretched out, chin on blanket, in a kind of
sly, cautious immobility. Only his eyes roamed over faces: his eyes
disdainful, penetrating and sad.
It was at that time that Belfast's devotion--and also his
pugnacity--secured universal respect. He spent every moment of his spare
time in Jimmy's cabin. He tended him, talked to him; was as gentle as
a woman, as tenderly gay as an old philanthropist, as sentimentally
careful of his nigger as a model slave-owner. But outside he was
irritable, explosive as gunpowder, sombre, suspicious, and never more
brutal than when most sorrowful.
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