FIRST SAILOR. The hold is full of treasure. SECOND SAILOR. Full to the hatches. FIRST SAILOR. Treasure and treasure. THIRD SAILOR. Boxes of precious spice. FIRST SAILOR. Ivory images with amethyst eyes. THIRD SAILOR. Dragons with eyes of ruby. FIRST SAILOR. The whole ship Flashes as if it were a net of herrings. THIRD SAILOR. Let’s home; I’d give some rubies to a woman. SECOND SAILOR. There’s somebody I’d give the amethyst eyes to. FIRST SAILOR. Let’s home and spend it in our villages. AIBRIC. [_Silencing them with a gesture._] We would return to our own country, Forgael, For we have found a treasure that’s so great Imagination cannot reckon it. And having lit upon this woman there, What more have you to look for on the seas? FORGAEL. I cannot—I am going on to the end. As for this woman, I think she is coming with me. AIBRIC. The ever-living have made you mad; but no, It was this woman in her woman’s vengeance That drove you to it, and I fool enough To fancy that she’d bring you home again. ’Twas you that egged him to it, for you know That he is being driven to his death. DECTORA. That is not true, for he has promised me An unimaginable happiness. AIBRIC. And if that happiness be more than dreams, More than the froth, the feather, the dustwhirl, The crazy nothing that I think it is, It shall be in the country of the dead, If there be such a country. DECTORA. No, not there, But in some island where the life of the world Leaps upward, as if all the streams o’ the world Had run into one fountain. AIBRIC. Speak to him. He knows that he is taking you to death; Speak—he will not deny it. DECTORA. Is that true? FORGAEL. I do not know for certain, but I know That I have the best of pilots. AIBRIC. Shadows, illusions, That the shape-changers, the ever-laughing ones, The immortal mockers have cast into his mind, Or called before his eyes. DECTORA. O carry me To some sure country, some familiar place. Have we not everything that life can give In having one another? FORGAEL. How could I rest If I refused the messengers and pilots With all those sights and all that crying out? DECTORA. But I will cover up your eyes and ears, That you may never hear the cry of the birds, Or look upon them. FORGAEL. Were they but lowlier I’d do your will, but they are too high—too high. DECTORA. Being too high, their heady prophecies But harry us with hopes that come to nothing, Because we are not proud, imperishable, Alone and winged. FORGAEL. Our love shall be like theirs When we have put their changeless image on. DECTORA. I am a woman, I die at every breath. AIBRIC.