Drowning

Why did the old Persians hold the sea holy? Why did the Greeks give it a separate deity, and own brother of Jove? Surely all this is not without meaning. And still deeper the meaning of that story of Narcissus, who because he could not grasp the tormenting, mild image he saw in the fountain, plunged into it and was drowned.

Wave after wave thus leaps into the ship, and finding no speedy vent runs roaring fore and aft, till the mariners come nigh to drowning while yet afloat. And ever, as the white moon shows her affrighted face from the steep gullies in the blackness overhead, aghast Jonah sees the rearing bowsprit pointing high upward, but soon beat downward again towards the tormented deep.

“Terrors upon terrors run shouting through his soul.

I take back the coat and watch—what says Ahab? We must save that boy.”

“He’s drowned with the rest on ’em, last night,” said the old Manx sailor standing behind them; “I heard; all of ye heard their spirits.”