All that rich world was asleep about them. There were no rules, no umpire, no spectators; but mere exhaustion, constantly compelling them to fall apart, divided the grotesque duel into rounds as
accurately as could be wished. Ransom could never remember how many of these rounds were fought.
The thing became like the frantic repetitions of delirium, and thirst a greater pain than any the adversary
could inflict. Sometimes they were both on the ground together. Once he was actually astride the
enemy's chest, squeezing its throat with both hands and-he found to his surprise-shouting a line out of
The Battle of Maldon: but it tore his arms so with its nails and so pounded his back with its knees that he
was thrown off.