XLVI.

_We_ could not pray together midst the deep, Which, like a floor of sapphire, round us lay, Through days of splendour, nights too bright for sleep, Soft, solemn, holy! We were on our way Unto the mighty Cordillera land, With men whom tales of that world’s golden strand Had lured to leave their vines. Oh! who shall say What thoughts rose in us, when the tropic sky Touch’d all its molten seas with sunset’s alchemy!