feat_summary_path: finished_summaries/cliffnotes/Lord Jim/section_11_part_0.txt
feat_book_id: Lord Jim.chapter 14
feat_summary_id: chapter 14
feat_summary: {"name": "Chapter 14", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201219145744/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/l/lord-jim/summary-and-analysis/chapter-14", "summary": "The day of Jim's sentencing arrived. Marlow imagined Jim on a scaffolding, ready to be beheaded. But Jim's punishment was not that romantic; still, however, it was every bit as cruel. Jim's certificate to be a British naval officer was canceled. He could never again serve aboard a ship -- except as a common sailor. Jim's dream of being a ship's officer and performing all sorts of heroic deeds had been shattered. He had planned to live forever on the sea; now he had to begin a new life, with the knowledge that he had been judged unfit to be responsible for other people. Marlow tried to talk with Jim after the sentencing, but he was too upset and dazed, and he pulled away. \"Let no man . . . \" he said thickly. Marlow stared after him for only a moment; then he turned his attention to \"Chester,\" an old, well-known roustabout sailor, who seemed anxious to talk. Chester asked Marlow if he would try to convince Jim that he had a future ahead of him if he would agree to be the chief overseer of forty coolies on a guano island that Chester planned to develop. Marlow could not imagine a worse future for Jim; he refused to even mention the job. He would not sentence Jim to such a fate.", "analysis": "This chapter presents the final, \"official\" verdict about Jim's jumping ship, and Conrad builds up suspense for it by having the court ask a series of unimportant questions. Then we hear the final verdict: \"Certificate cancelled.\" Having been branded as a coward and his certificate cancelled, what worse fate could befall Jim? Conrad hints at one possible \"worse\" fate in the episode concerning Chester and Robinson, who are two of the most disreputable men of the South Seas -- in fact, one of them, Robinson, has long been suspected of cannibalism. These two horrible creatures typify the dark powers that wait to swallow a discouraged and rejected man. They are introduced to show the change that is taking place within Marlow because Chester's suggestion fills Marlow with utter loathing. These two unsavory men need a kind of non-person to do their dirty work -- overseeing coolie labor in digging and sacking bird manure -- and they feel that the horribly disgraced Jim is just such a person, or non-person. Marlow, horrified at this completely decadent, immoral proposition, will not intervene. His view of Jim does not include such depraved labors or even working with such depraved men. Marlow is clearly so deeply involved with Jim that he cannot abandon him to such degradation."}
text: 'I slept little, hurried over my breakfast, and after a slight
  hesitation gave up my early morning visit to my ship. It was really
  very wrong of me, because, though my chief mate was an excellent man all
  round, he was the victim of such black imaginings that if he did not get
  a letter from his wife at the expected time he would go quite distracted
  with rage and jealousy, lose all grip on the work, quarrel with all
  hands, and either weep in his cabin or develop such a ferocity of temper
  as all but drove the crew to the verge of mutiny. The thing had always
  seemed inexplicable to me: they had been married thirteen years; I had a
  glimpse of her once, and, honestly, I couldn't conceive a man abandoned
  enough to plunge into sin for the sake of such an unattractive person. I
  don't know whether I have not done wrong by refraining from putting
  that view before poor Selvin: the man made a little hell on earth for
  himself, and I also suffered indirectly, but some sort of, no doubt,
  false delicacy prevented me. The marital relations of seamen would make
  an interesting subject, and I could tell you instances. . . . However,
  this is not the place, nor the time, and we are concerned with Jim--who
  was unmarried. If his imaginative conscience or his pride; if all the
  extravagant ghosts and austere shades that were the disastrous familiars
  of his youth would not let him run away from the block, I, who of course
  can't be suspected of such familiars, was irresistibly impelled to go
  and see his head roll off. I wended my way towards the court. I didn't
  hope to be very much impressed or edified, or interested or even
  frightened--though, as long as there is any life before one, a jolly
  good fright now and then is a salutary discipline. But neither did I
  expect to be so awfully depressed. The bitterness of his punishment was
  in its chill and mean atmosphere. The real significance of crime is in
  its being a breach of faith with the community of mankind, and from
  that point of view he was no mean traitor, but his execution was a
  hole-and-corner affair. There was no high scaffolding, no scarlet cloth
  (did they have scarlet cloth on Tower Hill? They should have had), no
  awe-stricken multitude to be horrified at his guilt and be moved to
  tears at his fate--no air of sombre retribution. There was, as I walked
  along, the clear sunshine, a brilliance too passionate to be consoling,
  the streets full of jumbled bits of colour like a damaged kaleidoscope:
  yellow, green, blue, dazzling white, the brown nudity of an undraped
  shoulder, a bullock-cart with a red canopy, a company of native infantry
  in a drab body with dark heads marching in dusty laced boots, a native
  policeman in a sombre uniform of scanty cut and belted in patent
  leather, who looked up at me with orientally pitiful eyes as though his
  migrating spirit were suffering exceedingly from that unforeseen--what
  d'ye call 'em?--avatar--incarnation. Under the shade of a lonely tree
  in the courtyard, the villagers connected with the assault case sat in a
  picturesque group, looking like a chromo-lithograph of a camp in a book
  of Eastern travel. One missed the obligatory thread of smoke in the
  foreground and the pack-animals grazing. A blank yellow wall rose behind
  overtopping the tree, reflecting the glare. The court-room was sombre,
  seemed more vast. High up in the dim space the punkahs were swaying
  short to and fro, to and fro. Here and there a draped figure, dwarfed
  by the bare walls, remained without stirring amongst the rows of empty
  benches, as if absorbed in pious meditation. The plaintiff, who had
  been beaten,--an obese chocolate-coloured man with shaved head, one
  fat breast bare and a bright yellow caste-mark above the bridge of his
  nose,--sat in pompous immobility: only his eyes glittered, rolling
  in the gloom, and the nostrils dilated and collapsed violently as he
  breathed. Brierly dropped into his seat looking done up, as though
  he had spent the night in sprinting on a cinder-track. The pious
  sailing-ship skipper appeared excited and made uneasy movements, as
  if restraining with difficulty an impulse to stand up and exhort
  us earnestly to prayer and repentance. The head of the magistrate,
  delicately pale under the neatly arranged hair, resembled the head of a
  hopeless invalid after he had been washed and brushed and propped up in
  bed. He moved aside the vase of flowers--a bunch of purple with a few
  pink blossoms on long stalks--and seizing in both hands a long sheet of
  bluish paper, ran his eye over it, propped his forearms on the edge of
  the desk, and began to read aloud in an even, distinct, and careless
  voice.
  
  'By Jove! For all my foolishness about scaffolds and heads rolling
  off--I assure you it was infinitely worse than a beheading. A heavy
  sense of finality brooded over all this, unrelieved by the hope of rest
  and safety following the fall of the axe. These proceedings had all the
  cold vengefulness of a death-sentence, and the cruelty of a sentence of
  exile. This is how I looked at it that morning--and even now I seem to
  see an undeniable vestige of truth in that exaggerated view of a common
  occurrence. You may imagine how strongly I felt this at the time.
  Perhaps it is for that reason that I could not bring myself to admit
  the finality. The thing was always with me, I was always eager to take
  opinion on it, as though it had not been practically settled: individual
  opinion--international opinion--by Jove! That Frenchman's, for instance.
  His own country's pronouncement was uttered in the passionless and
  definite phraseology a machine would use, if machines could speak. The
  head of the magistrate was half hidden by the paper, his brow was like
  alabaster.
  
  'There were several questions before the court. The first as to whether
  the ship was in every respect fit and seaworthy for the voyage. The
  court found she was not. The next point, I remember, was, whether up
  to the time of the accident the ship had been navigated with proper and
  seamanlike care. They said Yes to that, goodness knows why, and then
  they declared that there was no evidence to show the exact cause of
  the accident. A floating derelict probably. I myself remember that a
  Norwegian barque bound out with a cargo of pitch-pine had been given up
  as missing about that time, and it was just the sort of craft that would
  capsize in a squall and float bottom up for months--a kind of maritime
  ghoul on the prowl to kill ships in the dark. Such wandering corpses are
  common enough in the North Atlantic, which is haunted by all the terrors
  of the sea,--fogs, icebergs, dead ships bent upon mischief, and long
  sinister gales that fasten upon one like a vampire till all the strength
  and the spirit and even hope are gone, and one feels like the empty
  shell of a man. But there--in those seas--the incident was rare enough
  to resemble a special arrangement of a malevolent providence, which,
  unless it had for its object the killing of a donkeyman and the bringing
  of worse than death upon Jim, appeared an utterly aimless piece of
  devilry. This view occurring to me took off my attention. For a time I
  was aware of the magistrate's voice as a sound merely; but in a moment
  it shaped itself into distinct words . . . "in utter disregard of their
  plain duty," it said. The next sentence escaped me somehow, and
  then . . . "abandoning in the moment of danger the lives and property
  confided to their charge" . . . went on the voice evenly, and stopped. A
  pair of eyes under the white forehead shot darkly a glance above the
  edge of the paper. I looked for Jim hurriedly, as though I had expected
  him to disappear. He was very still--but he was there. He sat pink and
  fair and extremely attentive. "Therefore, . . ." began the voice
  emphatically. He stared with parted lips, hanging upon the words of the
  man behind the desk. These came out into the stillness wafted on the
  wind made by the punkahs, and I, watching for their effect upon him,
  caught only the fragments of official language. . . . "The Court . . .
  Gustav So-and-so . . . master . . . native of Germany . . . James
  So-and-so . . . mate . . . certificates cancelled." A silence fell. The
  magistrate had dropped the paper, and, leaning sideways on the arm of
  his chair, began to talk with Brierly easily. People started to move
  out; others were pushing in, and I also made for the door. Outside I
  stood still, and when Jim passed me on his way to the gate, I caught at
  his arm and detained him. The look he gave discomposed me, as though I
  had been responsible for his state he looked at me as if I had been the
  embodied evil of life. "It's all over," I stammered. "Yes," he said
  thickly. "And now let no man . . ." He jerked his arm out of my grasp. I
  watched his back as he went away. It was a long street, and he remained
  in sight for some time. He walked rather slow, and straddling his legs a
  little, as if he had found it difficult to keep a straight line. Just
  before I lost him I fancied he staggered a bit.
  
  '"Man overboard," said a deep voice behind me. Turning round, I saw a
  fellow I knew slightly, a West Australian; Chester was his name. He,
  too, had been looking after Jim. He was a man with an immense girth of
  chest, a rugged, clean-shaved face of mahogany colour, and two blunt
  tufts of iron-grey, thick, wiry hairs on his upper lip. He had
  been pearler, wrecker, trader, whaler too, I believe; in his own
  words--anything and everything a man may be at sea, but a pirate. The
  Pacific, north and south, was his proper hunting-ground; but he had
  wandered so far afield looking for a cheap steamer to buy. Lately he
  had discovered--so he said--a guano island somewhere, but its approaches
  were dangerous, and the anchorage, such as it was, could not be
  considered safe, to say the least of it. "As good as a gold-mine," he
  would exclaim. "Right bang in the middle of the Walpole Reefs, and if
  it's true enough that you can get no holding-ground anywhere in less
  than forty fathom, then what of that? There are the hurricanes, too. But
  it's a first-rate thing. As good as a gold-mine--better! Yet there's not
  a fool of them that will see it. I can't get a skipper or a shipowner
  to go near the place. So I made up my mind to cart the blessed stuff
  myself." . . . This was what he required a steamer for, and I knew he
  was just then negotiating enthusiastically with a Parsee firm for an
  old, brig-rigged, sea-anachronism of ninety horse-power. We had met and
  spoken together several times. He looked knowingly after Jim. "Takes
  it to heart?" he asked scornfully. "Very much," I said. "Then he's no
  good," he opined. "What's all the to-do about? A bit of ass's skin. That
  never yet made a man. You must see things exactly as they are--if you
  don't, you may just as well give in at once. You will never do anything
  in this world. Look at me. I made it a practice never to take anything
  to heart." "Yes," I said, "you see things as they are." "I wish I could
  see my partner coming along, that's what I wish to see," he said. "Know
  my partner? Old Robinson. Yes; _the_ Robinson. Don't _you_ know? The
  notorious Robinson. The man who smuggled more opium and bagged more
  seals in his time than any loose Johnny now alive. They say he used to
  board the sealing-schooners up Alaska way when the fog was so thick that
  the Lord God, He alone, could tell one man from another. Holy-Terror
  Robinson. That's the man. He is with me in that guano thing. The best
  chance he ever came across in his life." He put his lips to my ear.
  "Cannibal?--well, they used to give him the name years and years ago.
  You remember the story? A shipwreck on the west side of Stewart Island;
  that's right; seven of them got ashore, and it seems they did not get
  on very well together. Some men are too cantankerous for anything--don't
  know how to make the best of a bad job--don't see things as they are--as
  they _are_, my boy! And then what's the consequence? Obvious! Trouble,
  trouble; as likely as not a knock on the head; and serve 'em right too.
  That sort is the most useful when it's dead. The story goes that a boat
  of Her Majesty's ship Wolverine found him kneeling on the kelp, naked as
  the day he was born, and chanting some psalm-tune or other; light snow
  was falling at the time. He waited till the boat was an oar's length
  from the shore, and then up and away. They chased him for an hour up and
  down the boulders, till a marihe flung a stone that took him behind
  the ear providentially and knocked him senseless. Alone? Of course. But
  that's like that tale of sealing-schooners; the Lord God knows the right
  and the wrong of that story. The cutter did not investigate much. They
  wrapped him in a boat-cloak and took him off as quick as they could,
  with a dark night coming on, the weather threatening, and the ship
  firing recall guns every five minutes. Three weeks afterwards he was as
  well as ever. He didn't allow any fuss that was made on shore to upset
  him; he just shut his lips tight, and let people screech. It was bad
  enough to have lost his ship, and all he was worth besides, without
  paying attention to the hard names they called him. That's the man for
  me." He lifted his arm for a signal to some one down the street. "He's
  got a little money, so I had to let him into my thing. Had to! It
  would have been sinful to throw away such a find, and I was cleaned out
  myself. It cut me to the quick, but I could see the matter just as
  it was, and if I _must_ share--thinks I--with any man, then give me
  Robinson. I left him at breakfast in the hotel to come to court, because
  I've an idea. . . . Ah! Good morning, Captain Robinson. . . . Friend of
  mine, Captain Robinson."
  
  'An emaciated patriarch in a suit of white drill, a solah topi with a
  green-lined rim on a head trembling with age, joined us after crossing
  the street in a trotting shuffle, and stood propped with both hands on
  the handle of an umbrella. A white beard with amber streaks hung lumpily
  down to his waist. He blinked his creased eyelids at me in a bewildered
  way. "How do you do? how do you do?" he piped amiably, and tottered. "A
  little deaf," said Chester aside. "Did you drag him over six thousand
  miles to get a cheap steamer?" I asked. "I would have taken him twice
  round the world as soon as look at him," said Chester with immense
  energy. "The steamer will be the making of us, my lad. Is it my fault
  that every skipper and shipowner in the whole of blessed Australasia
  turns out a blamed fool? Once I talked for three hours to a man in
  Auckland. 'Send a ship,' I said, 'send a ship. I'll give you half of the
  first cargo for yourself, free gratis for nothing--just to make a good
  start.' Says he, 'I wouldn't do it if there was no other place on
  earth to send a ship to.' Perfect ass, of course. Rocks, currents, no
  anchorage, sheer cliff to lay to, no insurance company would take the
  risk, didn't see how he could get loaded under three years. Ass! I
  nearly went on my knees to him. 'But look at the thing as it is,' says
  I. 'Damn rocks and hurricanes. Look at it as it is. There's guano there
  Queensland sugar-planters would fight for--fight for on the quay, I
  tell you.' . . . What can you do with a fool? . . . 'That's one of your
  little jokes, Chester,' he says. . . . Joke! I could have wept. Ask
  Captain Robinson here. . . . And there was another shipowning fellow--a
  fat chap in a white waistcoat in Wellington, who seemed to think I was
  up to some swindle or other. 'I don't know what sort of fool you're
  looking for,' he says, 'but I am busy just now. Good morning.' I longed
  to take him in my two hands and smash him through the window of his own
  office. But I didn't. I was as mild as a curate. 'Think of it,' says I.
  '_Do_ think it over. I'll call to-morrow.' He grunted something about
  being 'out all day.' On the stairs I felt ready to beat my head against
  the wall from vexation. Captain Robinson here can tell you. It was awful
  to think of all that lovely stuff lying waste under the sun--stuff that
  would send the sugar-cane shooting sky-high. The making of Queensland!
  The making of Queensland! And in Brisbane, where I went to have a last
  try, they gave me the name of a lunatic. Idiots! The only sensible man
  I came across was the cabman who drove me about. A broken-down swell he
  was, I fancy. Hey! Captain Robinson? You remember I told you about my
  cabby in Brisbane--don't you? The chap had a wonderful eye for things.
  He saw it all in a jiffy. It was a real pleasure to talk with him. One
  evening after a devil of a day amongst shipowners I felt so bad that,
  says I, 'I must get drunk. Come along; I must get drunk, or I'll go
  mad.' 'I am your man,' he says; 'go ahead.' I don't know what I would
  have done without him. Hey! Captain Robinson."
  
  'He poked the ribs of his partner. "He! he! he!" laughed the Ancient,
  looked aimlessly down the street, then peered at me doubtfully with sad,
  dim pupils. . . . "He! he! he!" . . . He leaned heavier on the umbrella,
  and dropped his gaze on the ground. I needn't tell you I had tried to
  get away several times, but Chester had foiled every attempt by simply
  catching hold of my coat. "One minute. I've a notion." "What's your
  infernal notion?" I exploded at last. "If you think I am going in with
  you . . ." "No, no, my boy. Too late, if you wanted ever so much. We've
  got a steamer." "You've got the ghost of a steamer," I said. "Good
  enough for a start--there's no superior nonsense about us. Is there,
  Captain Robinson?" "No! no! no!" croaked the old man without lifting
  his eyes, and the senile tremble of his head became almost fierce with
  determination. "I understand you know that young chap," said Chester,
  with a nod at the street from which Jim had disappeared long ago. "He's
  been having grub with you in the Malabar last night--so I was told."
  
  'I said that was true, and after remarking that he too liked to live
  well and in style, only that, for the present, he had to be saving of
  every penny--"none too many for the business! Isn't that so, Captain
  Robinson?"--he squared his shoulders and stroked his dumpy moustache,
  while the notorious Robinson, coughing at his side, clung more than ever
  to the handle of the umbrella, and seemed ready to subside passively
  into a heap of old bones. "You see, the old chap has all the money,"
  whispered Chester confidentially. "I've been cleaned out trying to
  engineer the dratted thing. But wait a bit, wait a bit. The good time is
  coming." . . . He seemed suddenly astonished at the signs of impatience
  I gave. "Oh, crakee!" he cried; "I am telling you of the biggest thing
  that ever was, and you . . ." "I have an appointment," I pleaded mildly.
  "What of that?" he asked with genuine surprise; "let it wait." "That's
  exactly what I am doing now," I remarked; "hadn't you better tell me
  what it is you want?" "Buy twenty hotels like that," he growled to
  himself; "and every joker boarding in them too--twenty times over." He
  lifted his head smartly "I want that young chap." "I don't understand,"
  I said. "He's no good, is he?" said Chester crisply. "I know nothing
  about it," I protested. "Why, you told me yourself he was taking it to
  heart," argued Chester. "Well, in my opinion a chap who . . . Anyhow, he
  can't be much good; but then you see I am on the look-out for somebody,
  and I've just got a thing that will suit him. I'll give him a job on
  my island." He nodded significantly. "I'm going to dump forty coolies
  there--if I've to steal 'em. Somebody must work the stuff. Oh! I mean
  to act square: wooden shed, corrugated-iron roof--I know a man in Hobart
  who will take my bill at six months for the materials. I do. Honour
  bright. Then there's the water-supply. I'll have to fly round and get
  somebody to trust me for half-a-dozen second-hand iron tanks. Catch
  rain-water, hey? Let him take charge. Make him supreme boss over the
  coolies. Good idea, isn't it? What do you say?" "There are whole years
  when not a drop of rain falls on Walpole," I said, too amazed to laugh.
  He bit his lip and seemed bothered. "Oh, well, I will fix up something
  for them--or land a supply. Hang it all! That's not the question."
  
  'I said nothing. I had a rapid vision of Jim perched on a shadowless
  rock, up to his knees in guano, with the screams of sea-birds in his
  ears, the incandescent ball of the sun above his head; the empty sky and
  the empty ocean all a-quiver, simmering together in the heat as far as
  the eye could reach. "I wouldn't advise my worst enemy . . ." I began.
  "What's the matter with you?" cried Chester; "I mean to give him a good
  screw--that is, as soon as the thing is set going, of course. It's as
  easy as falling off a log. Simply nothing to do; two six-shooters in his
  belt . . . Surely he wouldn't be afraid of anything forty coolies could
  do--with two six-shooters and he the only armed man too! It's much
  better than it looks. I want you to help me to talk him over." "No!"
  I shouted. Old Robinson lifted his bleared eyes dismally for a moment,
  Chester looked at me with infinite contempt. "So you wouldn't advise
  him?" he uttered slowly. "Certainly not," I answered, as indignant as
  though he had requested me to help murder somebody; "moreover, I am sure
  he wouldn't. He is badly cut up, but he isn't mad as far as I know." "He
  is no earthly good for anything," Chester mused aloud. "He would just
  have done for me. If you only could see a thing as it is, you would
  see it's the very thing for him. And besides . . . Why! it's the most
  splendid, sure chance . . ." He got angry suddenly. "I must have a man.
  There! . . ." He stamped his foot and smiled unpleasantly. "Anyhow, I
  could guarantee the island wouldn't sink under him--and I believe he
  is a bit particular on that point." "Good morning," I said curtly. He
  looked at me as though I had been an incomprehensible fool. . . . "Must
  be moving, Captain Robinson," he yelled suddenly into the old man's ear.
  "These Parsee Johnnies are waiting for us to clinch the bargain." He
  took his partner under the arm with a firm grip, swung him round, and,
  unexpectedly, leered at me over his shoulder. "I was trying to do him
  a kindness," he asserted, with an air and tone that made my blood boil.
  "Thank you for nothing--in his name," I rejoined. "Oh! you are devilish
  smart," he sneered; "but you are like the rest of them. Too much in the
  clouds. See what you will do with him." "I don't know that I want to
  do anything with him." "Don't you?" he spluttered; his grey moustache
  bristled with anger, and by his side the notorious Robinson, propped
  on the umbrella, stood with his back to me, as patient and still as a
  worn-out cab-horse. "I haven't found a guano island," I said. "It's
  my belief you wouldn't know one if you were led right up to it by the
  hand," he riposted quickly; "and in this world you've got to see a thing
  first, before you can make use of it. Got to see it through and through
  at that, neither more nor less." "And get others to see it, too," I
  insinuated, with a glance at the bowed back by his side. Chester snorted
  at me. "His eyes are right enough--don't you worry. He ain't a puppy."
  "Oh, dear, no!" I said. "Come along, Captain Robinson," he shouted, with
  a sort of bullying deference under the rim of the old man's hat; the
  Holy Terror gave a submissive little jump. The ghost of a steamer was
  waiting for them, Fortune on that fair isle! They made a curious pair
  of Argonauts. Chester strode on leisurely, well set up, portly, and of
  conquering mien; the other, long, wasted, drooping, and hooked to his
  arm, shuffled his withered shanks with desperate haste.'
feat_summary_name: Chapter 14
target: The day of Jim's sentencing arrived. Marlow imagined Jim on a scaffolding, ready to be beheaded. But Jim's punishment was not that romantic; still, however, it was every bit as cruel. Jim's certificate to be a British naval officer was canceled. He could never again serve aboard a ship -- except as a common sailor. Jim's dream of being a ship's officer and performing all sorts of heroic deeds had been shattered. He had planned to live forever on the sea; now he had to begin a new life, with the knowledge that he had been judged unfit to be responsible for other people. Marlow tried to talk with Jim after the sentencing, but he was too upset and dazed, and he pulled away. "Let no man . . . " he said thickly. Marlow stared after him for only a moment; then he turned his attention to "Chester," an old, well-known roustabout sailor, who seemed anxious to talk. Chester asked Marlow if he would try to convince Jim that he had a future ahead of him if he would agree to be the chief overseer of forty coolies on a guano island that Chester planned to develop. Marlow could not imagine a worse future for Jim; he refused to even mention the job. He would not sentence Jim to such a fate.
feat_summary_analysis: This chapter presents the final, "official" verdict about Jim's jumping ship, and Conrad builds up suspense for it by having the court ask a series of unimportant questions. Then we hear the final verdict: "Certificate cancelled." Having been branded as a coward and his certificate cancelled, what worse fate could befall Jim? Conrad hints at one possible "worse" fate in the episode concerning Chester and Robinson, who are two of the most disreputable men of the South Seas -- in fact, one of them, Robinson, has long been suspected of cannibalism. These two horrible creatures typify the dark powers that wait to swallow a discouraged and rejected man. They are introduced to show the change that is taking place within Marlow because Chester's suggestion fills Marlow with utter loathing. These two unsavory men need a kind of non-person to do their dirty work -- overseeing coolie labor in digging and sacking bird manure -- and they feel that the horribly disgraced Jim is just such a person, or non-person. Marlow, horrified at this completely decadent, immoral proposition, will not intervene. His view of Jim does not include such depraved labors or even working with such depraved men. Marlow is clearly so deeply involved with Jim that he cannot abandon him to such degradation.