“Thrice cursed flames!” cried Media. “Is Mardi to be one conflagration? How it crackles, forks, and roars!—Is this our funeral pyre?”
“Recline, recline, my lord,” said Babbalanja. “Fierce flames are ever brief—a song, sweet Yoomy! Your pipe, old Mohi! Greater fires than this have ere now blazed in Mardi. Let us be calm;—the isles were made to burn;—Braid-Beard! hereafter, in some quiet cell, of this whole scene you will but make one chapter;—come, digest it now.”
“My face is scorched,” cried Media.
“The last, last day!” cried Mohi.
“Not so, old man,” said Babbalanja, “when that day dawns, ’twill dawn serene. Be calm, be calm, my potent lord.”
“Talk not of calm brows in storm-time!” cried Media fiercely. “See! how the flames blow over upon Dominora!”
“Yet the fires they kindle there are soon extinguished,” said Babbalanja. “No, no; Dominora ne’er can burn with Franko’s fires; only those of her own kindling may consume her.”
“Away! Away!” cried Media. “We may not touch Porpheero now.—Up sails! and westward be our course.”
So dead before the blast, we scudded.
Morning broke, showing no sign of land.