A harbor is a charming abode for a soul weary of the struggles of
life. The amplitude of the sky, the mobile architecture of the
clouds, the changing colorations of the sea, the scintillating of the
beacon-lights, form a prism marvellously adapted to entertain the
eyes without tiring them. The slender forms of the ships, with their
complicated rigging, to which the billows give harmonious oscillations,
serve to maintain the taste for rhythm and for beauty. And, above all,
there is a sort of mysterious and aristocratic pleasure for him who
no longer has curiosity or ambition, in contemplating, couched in the
turret or leaning on the pier, all the movements of those who depart
and those who return, of those who still have the strength to will, the
desire to travel or to acquire wealth.