Then the Abbot prayed to God that the waters might be
stayed, and God heard, and the sea came no farther.
And that this tale is true, and not a fable made by the weavers of
words, he who doubts may know from the fisher-folk, who to-day ply
their calling amongst the reefs and sandbanks of that lonely coast.
For there are those among them who, peering from the bows of their
small craft, have seen far down beneath their keels a city of
strange streets and many quays. But as to this, I, who repeat
these things to you, cannot speak of my own knowledge, for this
city of the sea is only visible when a rare wind, blowing from the
north, sweeps the shadows from the waves; and though on many a
sunny day I have drifted where its seven towers should once have
stood, yet for me that wind has never blown, pushing back the
curtains of the sea, and, therefore, I have strained my eyes in
vain.
But this I do know, that the rumbling stones of that ancient Abbey,
between which and the foam fringe of the ocean the town of seven
towers once lay, now stand upon a wave-washed cliff, and that he
who looks forth from its shattered mullions to-day sees only the
marshland and the wrinkled waters, hears only the plaint of the
circling gulls and the weary crying of the sea.
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