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 to have been. At night he returned to the spot where he had stepped ashore; there he found the woman sitting alone, braiding her hair. At her feet lay the raft which had carried him, lapped by the waves of the impassable sea, so that he could go no further. Dom Luiz sat down near her, and looked at the waves which carried off his thoughts one by one. When many hundreds of waves had come and gone, his heart overflowed with boundless grief, and he poured forth his plaint: how he had been wandering for two days and taken the measure of all the isle, but had nowhere found a city or harbour, nor any man in his own likeness; that all his companions had perished in the sea, and he was left alone on this island whence there was no return, alone among savages who spoke a language the words and meaning of which were unintelligible to him. So he bemoaned his fate, and the woman lay in the sand and listened to him till she went to sleep, lulled by the monotony of his plaint. Then Dom Luiz ceased to speak and breathed gently.

In the morning they sat together on a rock, high above the sea, and looked at the horizon. Dom Luiz thought over his whole life; he