In the moment after the sinking of the ship, under the water, the man remembers what he most loved at home--mornings in a fishing village, seeing the ships return; evenings in a like village, and the sound of his own mother's voice calling him home, as when he was a little child at play; then the old Norman city that he knew well, and the church processions of Corpus Christi (Body of Christ), the great event of the year for the poorer classes. Why he remembered such things at such a time he cannot say; it seemed to him a very ghostly experience, but not more ghostly than the sight of the sea and the moon when he rose again. The ship was gone and the crowd was gone, And the deep shuddered and the moon shone; And in a strait grasp my arms did span The mainyard rent from the mast where it ran; And on it with me was another man. Where lands were none 'neath the dim sea-sky, We told our names, that man and I. "O I am Godefroy de l'Aigle hight, And son I am to a belted knight." "And I am Berold the butcher's son, Who slays the beasts in Rouen town." The touch here, fine as it is, is perfectly natural. The common butcher finds himself not only for the moment in company with a nobleman, but able to talk to him as a friend. There is no rank or wealth between sky and sea--or, as a Japanese proverb says, "There is no king on the road of death." The refrain of the ballad utters the same truth: _Lands are swayed by a King on a throne_, _The sea hath no King but God alone._ Both in its realism and in its emotion this ballad is a great masterpiece. It is much superior to "The King's Tragedy," also founded upon history. "The King's Tragedy" seems to us a little strained; perhaps the poet attempted too much. I shall not quote from it, but will only recommend a reading of it to students of English literature because of its relation to a very beautiful story--the story of the courtship of James I of Scotland, and of how he came to write his poem called "The King's Quhair." Another ballad demands some attention and explanation, though it is not suitable for reading in the classroom. It is an expression of passion--but not passion merely human; rather superhuman and evil. For she who speaks in this poem is not a woman like "Sister Helen"; she is a demon. Not a drop of her blood was human, But she was made like a soft sweet woman.