there a dusky turbaned figure, bedizened in many colours, of some
Eastern sultan or hero, all inclined forward under the slant of
mighty bowsprits as if eager to begin another run of 11,000 miles
in their leaning attitudes. These were the fine figure-heads of
the finest ships afloat. But why, unless for the love of the life
those effigies shared with us in their wandering impassivity,
should one try to reproduce in words an impression of whose
fidelity there can be no critic and no judge, since such an
exhibition of the art of shipbuilding and the art of figure-head
carving as was seen from year's end to year's end in the open-air
gallery of the New South Dock no man's eye shall behold again? All
that patient, pale company of queens and princesses, of kings and
warriors, of allegorical women, of heroines and statesmen and
heathen gods, crowned, helmeted, bare-headed, has run for good off
the sea stretching to the last above the tumbling foam their fair,
rounded arms; holding out their spears, swords, shields, tridents
in the same unwearied, striving forward pose. And nothing remains
but lingering perhaps in the memory of a few men, the sound of
their names, vanished a long time ago from the first page of the
great London dailies; from big posters in railway-stations and the
doors of shipping offices; from the minds of sailors, dockmasters,
pilots, and tugmen; from the hail of gruff voices and the flutter
of signal flags exchanged between ships closing upon each other and
drawing apart in the open immensity of the sea.

The elderly, respectable seaman, withdrawing his gaze from that
multitude of spars, gave me a glance to make sure of our fellowship
in the craft and mystery of the sea. We had met casually, and had
got into contact as I had stopped near him, my attention being
caught by the same peculiarity he was looking at in the rigging of