BATTLE ISLAND AND ITS SCENERY.
WE sit down upon the summit of Battle Island, after a zigzag scramble up
its craggy side, and talk and sketch and scribble, as we rest and look
upon the blue, barren sea, and the brown and more barren continent, with
its mountains of desert rock. With all this desolateness, the
approaching sunset and the warm skies, the stern headlands, the white
icebergs and bleak islands, and the bay with its rays and points of
water, like a vast spangle on the savage landscape, all compose a
picture of singular novelty and grandeur; at the present moment,
wonderfully heightened in beauty and spirit by a distant shower, itself
a spectacle of brilliancy and darkness sweeping up from the north. Mr.
Hutchinson here joins us, looking all the pleasure that he feels, and
points out what is visible of the lengthy, but narrow field of his
religious labors. The harbor, with its vessels and various buildings,
lies quite below. One could very nearly throw a stone over the little
church spire, and shoot a rifle ball into the cliffs opposite. The air
is spiced with the most delicate odors, which invites us to a short
ramble in search of flowers, after which we descend to the parsonage for
tea.
I have stolen out upon the small front piazza with a chair, to enjoy the
warm sunshine and the sights of a Labrador village. The parsonage, which
has been closed for more than a year past, has been cleaned and put in
order by some kind Esquimaux parishioners, and looks neat and
comfortable. H—— has taken us all through, from room to room—to the
kitchen, pantry, bed-rooms, parlor, which serves also for dining-room,
library and study, to the school-room up stairs, which is used at times
as a chapel. As we passed the house clock, the pointer still upon the
hour where it stopped more than eighteen months ago, the painter wound
it up, and gave it a fresh start and the true time, which it began to
measure by loud and cheerful ticks, as if conscious that life and spirit
had returned again to the vacant dwelling. On the shelf, over the
fireplace, lay a prayer-book, the gift of Wordsworth to his nephew, with
an affectionate inscription on a fly-leaf, in his own handwriting, while
near by stood a couple of small pictures of the poet and his wife.
As some fishermen are now drawing in their capelin seine, we are going
to run down and see the sight. And quite a pretty sight it was. Not less
than a barrel or two were inclosed, which they dipped with a small
scoop-net into their boat, where they lay for a moment, fluttering like
so many little birds of gaudy plumage under the fowler’s net. The males
and females of these delicate fishes, are called here, very comically,
cocks and hens. As our boat, just then, came across from the vessel, the
fishers gave us a mess for breakfast, all of half a bushel, which we
carried over at once. At the sight of several fine salmon, on the
fishing-flake close by, fresh from the net, the poor little capelin sank
into immediate contempt. We must have a salmon or two. It was a question
whether we could not eat several. It resulted in the purchase of one of
sixteen pounds, at the cost of a dollar. We were pulled back immediately
in order to sup with Mr. Hutchinson, and spend the remainder of the
long, light evening in running over Battle Island. I shall not yield to
the temptation to dwell upon the brilliant sunset which we saw from the
summit rocks. Its glories were reflected in the bay, and shed upon the
grim wilderness, dissolving all its gloomy ruggedness into softest
beauty. No language can depict the still and solemn splendor of the
icebergs, reposing upon the burnished waters. Temples and mausoleums of
dazzling white, warming into tints of pink, or deepening on their shaded
side into the sweetest azure, seemed to be standing upon a mighty mirror
with their images below. I thought of that standing on the sea of glass,
in the glorious visions of St. John, and was filled with emotions of
wonder and admiration. The words of the psalmist could hardly fail to be
remembered: “These men see the works of the Lord, and his wonders in the
deep.”
One would think that all is couleur de rose in these lands beyond the
reach of fashionable summer tourists. Let him remember that nature here
blooms, beautifies, and bears for the entire year, in a few short weeks.
We are in the very flush of that transient and charming time. Believe
me, when I speak of the plants and flowers, shrubbery and mosses. At
this moment, the rocky isle, bombarded by the ocean, and flayed by the
sword of the blast for months in the year, is a little paradise of
beauty. There are fields of mossy carpet that sinks beneath the foot,
with beds of such delicate flowers as one seldom sees.
There is a refined delicacy in the odor, which the ordinary flora of
warmer climes seldom has. Some rare exotic, reared with cost, and
pampered by all the appliances of art, may suggest the subtle spirit of
these tiny blossoms. It steals upon the sense of smell with the
indescribable tenderness of the music of the æolian harp upon the ear.
As I enjoy it, I know that I cannot paint it to the reader, and that I
shall probably never “look upon its like again.” It is very likely that
the cool and very pure air, a refinement of our common atmosphere, has
much to do with it.
In our stroll, we found banks of snow still sleeping in the fissures
above the showering of the surf, and peeping out from beneath their
edges were clusters of pretty flowers. As we returned in the twilight,
upon the mournful stillness of which broke the voice of the surge, I
lingered upon the cliffs to listen to the wood-thrush, the same most
plaintive and sweet bird that sings in the Catskill mountain woods, at
dusk and in the early morning. The pathos of its wild melody stole in
upon the heart, waking “thoughts too deep for tears,” and calling up a
throng of tender memories of Cole and others, with whom the songster,
the hour, and mountain scenery are forever associated. Startled by the
voices of my companions, one a nephew of the famous poet, and the other
a pupil of the painter scarcely less renowned, I hastened to join them
at the humble parsonage below the cliffs, when we went across to the
vessel, and united, for the last time in the cabin, in those pleasant
devotions which we had enjoyed, morning and evening, since our departure
from St. Johns.