THE OPAL SEA 



Cities xinder 

 the sea. 



Forttme 

 seekers. 



had been seen beneath the wave, of silent pal- 

 aces with towers and walls and blue-green 

 grottoes all tenantless save to the soft flooding 

 of the under-ciirrents. Nothing lived or moved 

 there but the monsters of the deep. It was a 

 kino'dom of silence, a realm of the dead. So 

 deep-rooted was this belief that the very name, 

 " mare," came to suggest the shores of the abode 

 of the dead. It was not to be wondered at that 

 with such weird whisperings the sea should 

 seem a fear-compelling place. 



Yet with all the dread of the great waste, 

 with all the danger, there was a glamour about 

 it that drew men on. Ships sailed away and 

 never came back, but others took their place. 

 Fame and fortune were alluring prizes. Be- 

 yond the Pillars were the " Western Islands " 

 where no snow or cold ever fell, where the 

 meadows and uplands surpassed the Garden of 

 the Hesperides and the sands of the shore glit- 

 tered with gold. Wealth and empire danced in 

 the sailor's brain. Where the rainbow rested, 

 at the end of the earth, there lay the crown and 

 the treasure. Others there were — visionaries, 

 adventurers, sea-rovers — who with no great love 

 of possessions, still felt drawn to the sea. No 

 matter how frightfully she buffeted the earth- 

 children, nor how violently she cast them 



