Idylls of the Sea and Other Marine Sketches
9781465654632
118 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
For six weeks we had simmered in unwinking sunblaze by day, and by night had stared with ever-fresh wonder at the blue-black immensity above, bejewelled with stars as the sand on the sea-shore for multitude. Among the glorious host of heaven the dazzling moon sailed on her stately way, the radiant splendour of her rays almost unbearable in their penetrating power. Beneath us the waveless ocean lay like another sky, its levelled surface unruffled by the faintest zephyr. On moonless nights it was often hard to divest oneself of the idea that we were floating in mid-air, so little difference was there between below and above. Our passage, already over long, seemed to have ended here, a thousand miles from land, and far out of the track of other ships. For some time this wondrous restfulness of all the elements fell upon our souls like the soothing touch of a mother’s hand upon the fevered head of her child. In the night watches voices were hushed, and whispered converse came gently from lips unaccustomed to such topics, upon subjects exalted and solemn. Even during the day, while engaged in severe toil—for our careful captain was utilising this unwelcome opportunity in a general refit—it seemed as if all hands were under a deep impression of gravity, as though conscious of contact with the eternities. But this feeling of awe, which was almost involuntary worship, gradually gave place as the days passed in changeless procession to an increasing sense of indefinite fear. Each man looked askance at his fellow’s face, fearfully seeking sight of that shadow he felt upon his own. One unspoken question trembled on every lip, one overmastering idea blended with and tinctured all others. A change, unusual as unwholesome, came over the bright blue of the sea. No longer did it reflect, as in a limpid mirror, the splendour of the sun, the sweet silvery glow of the moon, or the coruscating clusters of countless stars. Like the ashen-grey hue that bedims the countenance of the dying, a filmy greasy skin appeared to overspread the recent loveliness of the ocean’s surface. The sea was sick, stagnant, and foul. From its turbid waters arose a miasmatic vapour like a breath of decay, which clung clammily to the palate and dulled all the senses. Drawn by some strange force from the unfathomable depths below, eerie shapes sought the surface, blinking glassily at the unfamiliar glare they had exchanged for their native gloom,—uncouth creatures bedight with tasselled fringes like weed-growths waving around them, fathom-long medusæ with coloured spots like eyes clustering all over their transparent substance, wriggling worm-like forms of such elusive matter that the smallest exposure to the sun melted them, and they were not. Lower down, vast pale shadows crept sluggishly along, happily undistinguishable as yet, but adding a half-familiar flavour to the strange, faint smell that hung about us. Of the ordinary fish which attend a vessel under healthful conditions few were to be seen. Such stragglers as occasionally came near were languid and purposeless in their movements, as if infected by the universal malaise that only fostered foul and fermenting growths. The sole exceptions were the sharks, who came and went as stealthily, but as eagerly as ever. Such a morbific, unwholesome condition of our environment as this utter cessation of the revivifying motion of the aerial ocean, with its beneficent reaction upon the watery world beneath, could not fail sooner or later to affect the health of the crew. Doubtless the heavy toil in which all hands were continually engaged during the day put off the coming disaster longer than would otherwise have been the case. But the ship was ill found, the meat was partially decayed, and the bread honeycombed by various vermin.
