at war with the sea and to jeer at the sea's desire. When tempests are
seething and roaring from the Aesir's inverted bowl all seamen have
heard his shouting and the cry that his mirth sends up: when the rim of
the sea tilts up, and the world's roof wavers down, his face gleams
white where distraught waves smite the Swimmer they may not tire. No
eyes were allotted this Swimmer, but in blindness, with ceaseless jeers,
he battles till time be done with, and the love-songs of earth be sung,
and the very last dirge be sung, and a baffled and outworn sea
begrudgingly own Oriander alone may mock at the might of its ire."

"Truly, Manuel, that sounds like a parent to be proud of, and not at all
like a church-going parent, and of course his blindness would account
for that squint of yours. Yes, certainly it would. So do you tell me
about this blind Oriander, and how he came to meet your mother Dorothy
of the White Arms, as I suppose he did somewhere or other."

"Oh, no," says Manuel, "for Oriander never leaves off swimming, and so
he must stay always in the water. So he never actually met my mother,
and she married Emmerick, who was my nominal father. But such and such
things happened."

Then Manuel told Niafer all about the circumstances of Manuel's birth in
a cave, and about the circumstances of Manuel's upbringing in and near
Rathgor and the two boys talked on and on, while the unborn dreams went
drifting by outside; and within the small wrinkled old man sat listening
with a very doubtful smile, and saying never a word.

"And why is your hair cut so queerly, Manuel?"

"That, Niafer, we need not talk about, in part because it is not going