noon
`` Yes , poor boat '' . She was nine miles away ; in four minutes she was less than seven , and now distinct : -- her three staysails ; her four funnels ; the stretched-out space between her raked masts ; her host of cowls and boats ; her high victorious hull , silently running . And all along her lines were lines of faces thick as dahlia-rows in June -- globe-trotters ; captains of industry ; children ; the Wall Street operator who plotted a stroke in Black-Sea wool , and to him time was money -- I guess ; commercial travellers , all-modern , spinning , prone , to whom the sea was an insignificant and conquered thing ; engineers ; capped enthusiastic Germans , going forth to conquer ; publishers , ladies , lords , all the nondescript prosperous : and all ran there blithe , sublime , and long drawn-out ; and they toyed with oranges , nuts ; and they looked abroad to see the _ Boodah _ -- ship 's - surgeons and officers with them -- jesting , as they munched or sucked . But the Captain who had often seen the _ Boodah _ , was log-writing in the chart-room ... As her ensign of greeting ran up her main , her clocks struck twelve , the full noon -- like an omen -- come ; she not then three miles from the _ Boodah _ . And simultaneously with the hoisting of that ensign , and the striking of those clocks , the old-worn wheels of Roman Civilization stopped dead . The _ Boodah _ ran up the signal : `` _ Stop ! _ '' Those who understood rubbed their eyes : it was like a vision at high noon ; they could not believe .