Once the danger to the lifeboat and the crew has been made clear, the narrator describes the feeling of camaraderie that develops aboard the boat: "It would be difficult to describe the subtle brotherhood of men that was here established on the seas. No one said that it was so. No one mentioned it. But it dwelt in the boat, and each man felt it warm him. They were a captain, an oiler, a cook, and a correspondent, and they were friends, friends in a more curiously iron-bound degree that may be common". What about their unpredictable and unlikely situation makes the four men such fast friends? What causes them to become so intimate so quickly? Why does the correspondent describe the ordeal as the "best experience" of his life?