e stained front of the Mint,
cleansed by the flood of light, stood out for a moment dazzling and
white like a marble palace in a fairy tale. The crew of the Narcissus
drifted out of sight.

I never saw them again. The sea took some, the steamers took others,
the graveyards of the earth will account for the rest. Singleton has
no doubt taken with him the long record of his faithful work into the
peaceful depths of an hospitable sea. And Donkin, who never did a decent
day's work in his life, no doubt earns his living by discoursing with
filthy eloquence upon the right of labour to live. So be it! Let the
earth and the sea each have its own.

A gone shipmate, like any other man, is gone for ever; and I never met
one of them again. But at times the spring-flood of memory sets with
force up the dark River of the Nine Bends. Then on the waters of the
forlorn stream drifts a ship--a shadowy ship manned by a crew of Shades.
They pass and make a sign, in a shadowy hail. Haven't we, together
and upon the immortal sea, wrung out a meaning from our sinful lives?
Good-bye, brothers! You were a good crowd. As good a crowd as ever
fisted with wild cries the beating canvas of a heavy foresail; or
tossing aloft, invisible in the night, gave back yell for yell to a
westerly gale.

THE END

End of Project Gutenberg's The Nigger Of The "Narcissus", by Joseph Conrad

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