Book 11
the ghost of my dead husband. If you ask
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description of it, I must truly say
he did not have his well known features—he
was not so cheerful as he was in life!
Alas, I saw him pale and naked, with
his hair still dripping—his ghost from the waves
stood on this very spot:” and while she moaned
she sought his footprints on the floor. “Alas,
this was my fear, and this is what my mind
shuddered to think of, when I begged that you
would not desert me for the wind's control.
But how I wish, since you were sailing forth
to perish, that you had but taken me
with you. If I had gone with you, it would
have been advantage to me, for I should
have shared the whole course of my life with you
and you would not have met a separate death.
I linger here but I have met my death,
I toss on waves, and drift upon the sea.
“My heart would be more cruel than the waves,
if it should ask me to endure this life—
if I should struggle to survive such grief.
I will not strive nor leave you so forlorn,
at least I'll follow you to death. If not
the urn at least the lettered stone
shall keep us still together. If your bones
are not united with my bones, 'tis sure
our names must be united.”Overcome
with grief, she could not say another word—
but she continued wailing, and her groans
were heaved up from her sorrow-stricken breast.
At early dawn, she went from her abode
down to the seashore, where most wretchedly,
she stood upon the spot from which he sailed,
and sadly said; “He lingered here while he
was loosening the cables, and he kissed
me on this seashore when he left me here.”
And while she called to recollection all
that she had seen when standing there, and while
she looked far out on flowing waves from there,
