Ay, Jarl! wast thou not forever intent upon minding that which so many neglect--thine own especial business?
Wast thou not forever at it, too, with no likelihood of ever winding up thy moody affairs, and striking a balance sheet?
But at times how wearisome to me these everlasting reveries in my one solitary companion.

I longed for something enlivening; a burst of words; human vivacity of one kind or other.

After in vain essaying to get something of this sort out of Jarl, I tried it all by myself; playing upon my body as upon an instrument; singing, halloing, and making empty gestures, till my Viking stared hard; and I myself paused to consider whether I had run crazy or no.
But how account for the Skyeman's gravity?
Surely, it was based upon no philosophic taciturnity; he was nothing of an idealist; an aerial architect; a constructor of flying buttresses.

It was inconceivable, that his reveries were Manfred-like and exalted, reminiscent of unutterable deeds, too mysterious even to be indicated by the remotest of hints.

Suppositions all out of the question.
His ruminations were a riddle.