Even when I spoke to him he did not call home that look, but
answered me dreamily with that same fixed stare as though his
thoughts were heaving on far and lonely seas. I asked him what ship
he had come by, for there were many there. The sailing ships were
there with their sails all furled and their masts straight and still like a
wintry forest; the steamers were there, and great liners, puffing up idle
smoke into the twilight. He answered he had come by none of them.
I asked him what line he worked on, for he was clearly a sailor; I
mentioned well-known lines, but he did not know them. Then I asked
him where he worked and what he was. And he said: "I work in the
Sargasso Sea, and I am the last of the pirates, the last left alive." And
I shook him by the hand I do not know how many times. I said: "We
feared you were dead. We feared you were dead." And he answered
sadly: "No. No. I have sinned too deeply on the Spanish seas: I am
not allowed to die."
THE DREAM OF KING KARNA-VOOTRA
King Karna-Vootra sitting on his throne commanding all things said:
"I very clearly saw last night the queenly Vava-Nyria. Though partly
she was hidden by great clouds that swept continually by her, rolling
over and over, yet her face was unhidden and shone, being full of
moonlight.
"I said to her:
"'Walk with me by the great pools in many-gardened, beautiful
Istrakhan where the lilies float that give delectable dreams; or,
drawing aside the curtain of hanging orchids, pass with me thence
from the pools by a secret path through the else impassable jungle
that fills the only way between the mountains that shut in Istrakhan.
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