and my mother sat sewing beside a shaded lamp and singing to
herself. I fingered the book that lay beside me, on the
window-seat, and said:

"Mother, did you keep the book just here all the time I was
gone because you were sorry I went and wanted to remember
me?"

She laughed, and said: "Yes, all the time while you were
sailing to the Port of Stars. Come now to supper, my dear."

So I got up very stiffly, for I felt weak and dizzy still,
and went with her. I said:

"I'm sorry, Mother, that after all I couldn't bring you any
of the jewels."

Whereupon she laughed again and said something about
"Cornelia" which I am too modest to repeat, but which, being
scholars, you will know by heart, and said that she was glad
enough to have me back at all.

Sirs, you cannot think how beautiful our little dining-room
looked to me, with the old brass-handled highboy in the
corner and the pots of flowers on the sill--far more
beautiful than the fretted golden towers and gem-girdled
walls of the City under the Sea.

So take my advice, young sirs, the advice of a man many years
older than you bold young blades: don't you ever go listening