One had sunk his thumbs into the
eye-sockets of his opponent, who, in turn, had buried his teeth in the
flesh of the other's arm. A wild creature, almost hidden in the long
tangle of her hair, crouched there, the only spectator of the battle,
chanting in weird tones: 'Ai! Ai! the call of the wild summons you to
the death-grapple, oh Men, and me to sing who am Woman! Fight on, oh
Men; for it is Good! The Race, the Sons of your strong loins through the
dizzy whirl-dance of all time, are watching you. Match man-strength
against man-strength, breath-rhythm against breath-rhythm, and
knee-thrust against knee-thrust!' And then one of the combatants fell,
and the victor with a yell of triumph seized the woman by the hair and,
flinging her over his shoulder, staggered off, and we heard them call
to each other, 'Oh, my Male!' 'Oh, my Female!' Then we were in our own
grove by the beach and Alice whispered dreamily, 'Dearest, how tame are
our lives.'"
"I think I begin to understand," said I. "What happened was simply that
you had walked right out of the Advertising Supplement into the Fiction
pages; and that was Jack London.
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