oaths, low laughs, whispers, sobs. But I was cool, high, separate. To
me it was

"A painted ship
Upon a painted ocean."

The sails were shaken out, and the ship began to move. It was a fair
breeze, perhaps, and no steamer was needed to tow her away. She
receded down the bay. Friends turned back--I could not see them--and
waved their hands, and wiped their eyes, and went home to dinner.
Farther and farther from the ships at anchor, the lessening vessel
became single and solitary upon the water. The sun sank in the west;
but I watched her still. Every flash of her sails, as she tacked and
turned, thrilled my heart.

Yet Prue was not on board. I had never seen one of the passengers or
the crew. I did not know the consignees, nor the name of the vessel. I
had shipped no adventure, nor risked any insurance, nor made any bet,
but my eyes clung to her as Ariadne's to the fading sail of
Theseus. The ship was freighted with more than appeared upon her
papers, yet she was not a smuggler. She bore all there was of that
nameless lading, yet the next ship would carry as much. She was
freighted with fancy. My hopes, and wishes, and vague desires, were
all on board. It seemed to me a treasure not less rich than that which
filled the East Indiaman at the old dock in my boyhood.

When, at length, the ship was a sparkle upon the horizon, I waved my
hand in last farewell, I strained my eyes for a last glimpse. My mind
had gone to sea, and had left noise behind. But now I heard again the
multitudinous murmur of the city, and went down rapidly, and threaded