Hemingway illustrates this notion with the image of the helpful Manolin carrying the old man’s coiled lines, harpoon, and sail, which “looked like a flag of permanent defeat” (9). These objects—phallic symbols—convey the idea that the old man’s masculinity is being passed on to the young boy. Even more explicit than the former psychoanalytic images is the idea that Santiago lost his last grasp on masculinity when the only thing he had power over was taken from him. After his fishing progeny has been taken away, Santiago has been castrated.  The only prosperous characteristic of the old man is his eyes:  “His eyes…were the same color of the sea and were cheerful and undefeated” (10).  However, this connection between his eyes and the sea effeminates him further, in that the sea is personified as a woman, or la mar (29).