noon
I was no sooner on board the _ Stettin _ than her engines were straining under what was equivalent to forced draught . On the previous day it would have little surprised me at any moment , while I drove her , to be carried to the clouds in an explosion from her deep-rusted steel tanks : but this day such a fear never crossed my mind : for I knew very well that I was immortal till I saw her . The sea was not only perfectly smooth , but placid , as on the previous day : only it seemed far placider , and the sun brighter , and there was a levity in the breezes that frilled the sea in fugitive dark patches , like _ frissons _ of tickling ; and I thought that the morning was a true marriage-morning , and remembered that it was a Sabbath ; and sweet odours our wedding would not lack of peach and almond , though , looking eastward , I could see no faintest sign of any purple cloud , but only rags of chiffon under the sun ; and it would be an eternal wedding , for one day in our sight would be as a thousand years , and our thousand years of bliss would be but one day , and in the evening of all that eternity death would come and sweetly lay its finger upon our languid lids , and we should die of weary bliss ; and all manner of dancings and singings -- fandango and light galliard , corantoes and the solemn gavotte -- were a-tune in my heart that happy day ; and running by the chart-house to the wheel , I saw under the table a great roll of old flags , and presently they were flying in a long curve of gala from the main ; and the sea rumpled in a long tract of tumbling milk behind me ; and I hasted homeward , to meet my heart . * * * * * No purple cloud could I see as , on and on , for two hours , I tore southward : but at hot noon , on the weather beam I spied through the glass across the water something else which moved , and it was you who came to me , Oh Leda , my spirit 's breath ! I bore down upon her , waving : and soon I saw her stand like an ancient mariner , but in white muslins that fluttered , at her wheel on the bridge -- it was one of those little old Havre-Antwerp craft very high in the bows -- and she waved a little white thing . And we came nearer , till I could spy her face , her smile , and I shouted her to stop , and in a minute stopped myself , and by happy steering came with slowing headway to a slight crash by her side , and ran down the trellised steps to her , and led her up ; and on the deck , without saying a word , I fell to my knees before her , and I bowed my brow to the floor , with obeisance , and I worshipped her there as Heaven . And we were wedded : for she , too , bowed the knee with me under the jovial blue sky ; and under her eyes were the little moist semicircles of dreamy pensive fatigue , so dear and wifish : and God was there , and saw her kneel : for He loves the girl .