![]() ![]() ![]() The year was 1816, and in France a shaky monarchy had been established in place of Napoleon, whose final defeat had come after 23 years of constant war. The story of the drifting raft sent shivers of horror through a Europe which had already supped full of blood. Hacking off limbs and tearing back the skin, the survivors began slicing and scooping out the brownish-purple flesh. Then their eyes fell on the dead human bodies strewn about the raft. ![]() The starving remnant, smeared with blood and blistered red by the sun, chewed the oiled leather of their scabbards and ammunition pouches others ate bits of their hats. Intoxicated by wine, the only drink, and maddened by despair, some of the soldiers had tried to hack the raft to pieces, and in the battle that followed, 60 people had been killed or committed suicide. How did any of them survive? By dawn on the third day under the West African sun, cut away from the lifeboats which had pledged to tow it to safety, the raft of the frigate Medusa was strewn with the dead and dying. ![]()
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