The sea her girdle, and her crown the sky;

Her life-blood throbs, the fevered pulses fly.

Immense, defiant, breathless she stands there.

“And ever listens in the ceaseless din,

Waiting for him, her lover, who shall come,

Whose singing lips shall boldly claim their own,

And render sonant what in her was dumb,

The splendour, and the madness, and the sin,

Her dreams in iron and her thoughts of stone.”

He paused. The boat glided on. For a long time neither spoke a word.

After a while Jack broke the silence: