“Anywhere from one to ten miles.”
I stopped and listened again. Suddenly the full majesty of the sea sweeping about this island at this point caught me. The entire city was surrounded by water. Its great buildings and streets were all washed about by that same sea-green salty flood which I had seen coming over from Jersey City, and beyond were the miles and miles of dank salt meadows, traversed by railroads. Huge liners from abroad were even now making their way here. At its shores were ranged in rows great vessels from Europe and all other parts of the world, all floating quietly upon the bosom of this great river. There were tugs and small boats and sailing vessels, and beyond all these, eastward, the silence, the majesty, the deadly earnestness of the sea.
“Do you ever think how wonderful it is to have the sea so close?” I asked.
“No, I can’t say that I do,” replied my brother-in-law.
“Nor I,” said my sister. “You get used to all those things here, you know.”
“It’s wonderful, my boy,” said my brother, as usual helpfully interested. He invariably seemed to approve of all my moods and approaches to sentiment, and, like a mother who admires and spoils a child, was anxious to encourage and indulge me. “Great subject, the sea.”
I could not help smiling, he was so naïf and simple and intellectually innocent and sweet.
“It’s a great city,” I said suddenly, the full import of it all sweeping over me. “I think I’d like to live here.”
“Didn’t I tell you! Didn’t I tell you!” exclaimed my brother gayly. “They all fall for it! Now it’s the ocean vessels that get him. You take my advice, my boy, and move down here. The quicker the better for you.”
I replied that I might, and then tried to forget the vessels and their sirens, but could not. The sea! The sea! And this great city! Never before was I so anxious to explore a city, and never before so much in awe of one either. It seemed so huge and powerful and terrible. There was something about it which made me seem useless and trivial. Whatever one might have been elsewhere, what could one be here?