shore, enjoy much opportunity of feeling the grandeur,—the awful
variety of night. Women are necessarily debarred from the privilege of
partaking freely of its mysterious but ennobling influence by the
restraints unfortunately requisite for their protection; and, in order
to reap the full advantage of such communion, we must be _alone_ with
the queen of the ebon wand and starry diadem. As for those of the bolder
sex,—by them, the hours of shade are usually devoted to study,
pleasure, or dissipation, and only the few possessing the poetic
temperament become familiar with her changeful moods.
But, on the ocean, the closeness of the cabin drives the novice
frequently on deck, even in stormy weather and at unseasonable hours;
and when once this compulsory introduction has been effected, it is
surprising how rapidly the traveller, of either sex, becomes enamored of
solitude and night—of starlight and the storm.
The changes in the heavens,—and the waters too—are quite as numerous
and far more impressive by night than by day.—There is no sameness in
the sea for those who are blest with capacity to feel the beauties of
Nature.
Let us lounge away an hour of this lovely evening here, by the
companion-way. We are between the trades, and time would hang heavily on
our hands but for the baffling winds and tempting cats-paws that keep us
perpetually on the alert to gain or save a mile of southing.[2] At
present, we are suffering all the tedium of a calm. How dark!—How
absolutely black the sky appears, contrasted with the brightness of a
tropical moon! And yon dazzling star, waving its long line of reflected
rays athwart the glassy billows, rivalling the broad glare of the
moonlight!—What diamond ever equalled it in lustre, or surpassed it in
variety of hues, as its ray changes from red to yellow, and from yellow
to the most delicate blue?
The sails are flapping against the mast and the ship rolls so gently
that one might well suppose no gale had ever ruffled this smooth summer
ocean. To see the sailors lolling on the watch, the observer would infer
they lead the idlest lives that mortals could enjoy; but alas! such
moments are like angel visits with the crew. Poor fellows! How rich to
them is the delight of a single hour of freedom spent in spinning their
“tough yarns” under the lea of the long-boat, in singing or in music!
That clarionet is admirably played, for rough and tarry fingers:—and
how softly the notes float on the damp night air! The mate, in his
impatience, is _whistling for a wind_; and that “old salt,” in whom many
years of service have implanted deeply all the superstitions of his
class, is muttering to himself with discontented glances, “You’ll have a
cap-full, and more than you want of it before long,—and in the wrong
quarter too.—I never knew any good to come of this whistling for wind.”
And, in truth, to judge from appearances, the prophecy is likely, in
this case, to be fulfilled. Already the moon begins to be encircled by a
wide halo of vapor. It is almost imperceptible at present; but, even
while we speak, it gathers, and thickens, and seems to become more
palpable. Now it assumes the faint tints of the lunar rain-bow; and all
around a silvery veil is falling over the face of the heavens.
Slight fleeces of denser mist are collecting in columns and squadrons
across the sky, giving it a mottled aspect. They are still too thin
materially to check the full-flooding of the moonlight; but, as they
gradually enlarge themselves, a slow, gliding motion is perceived among
them. They are wafted gently southward; but the breeze—if breeze there
be to-night—will come from the opposite quarter; for the higher and
lower currents of our atmosphere are almost invariably found thus at
variance with each other. The signs of the weather augur nothing
favorable to our success in speedily reaching the southern trades.
Mark! How the broad glare of the moon-beams on the water fades away as
the vapors in the upper air increase in density! The starlight
reflection has disappeared; and the bright little orb from which it was
derived, still struggling hard to make itself conspicuous, shines on
with fitful ray.—And now, it is extinct.—Even the waters have lost
their azure hue, and all things above and below are rapidly becoming
gray.
The swell is momentarily rising, though you discover no cause for the
change. Though we feel not a puff of wind the sails flap less heavily
against the mast, and occasionally they are buoyed up and bellied out
for many seconds, as if lifted by the breath of some unseen spirit.
Listen to the voice of the waves!—For the sea has a voice as well as
the winds—not only where it speaks in thunders, booming upon the level
beach, or roars among the time-worn rocks of an iron-bound coast, but
far off in its loneliness, also, where no barrier opposes its will. Who
knows not the mild tone of the breeze of spring from the melancholy moan
of the autumnal gale?—As different is the dull plash of the lazy billow
in a settled calm from the threatening sound that precedes a storm.
But the steward is ringing his supper-bell. Let us go below, and if I
mistake not, you will find all nature dressed in another garb when we
return on deck.
* * * * *
An hour has passed,—and what a change!—The ship close hauled on a
wind, no longer rolls listlessly over the swell; but, laboring slowly up
each coming wave, she staggers and shivers from stem to stern, as the
crest of the watery mountain dashes against the weather bow,—then,
rushing down into the trough of the sea and plunging deep into the
succeeding billow, she strains every shroud and back-stay with the
sudden jerk of the masts, and sends a broad sheet of crackling foam to
leeward from beneath the bows.
How different is this disagreeable motion from that which we enjoy when
the wind is on the beam or the quarter!—Then, we glide gently over the
sea-hills, and every wave seems playfully bent on urging us
forward:—Now, we are opposed unceasingly by wind and swell, and must
contest laboriously each foot of the battle-ground, till the strength of
our enemies is exhausted—conscious the while, that every league we
loose in this strange, fitful region, may cost us a week’s delay in the
recovery.
This is “a young gale” that bids fair to prove precocious; for it is
rapidly advancing towards maturity. But it cannot last. Nothing but a
calm displays much tendency to permanence between the trades.
The heavens are dark as midnight:—no star or planet penetrates the
gloom with a friendly ray:—yet the color of the overhanging vault is by
no means uniform. Broad tracts or patches of intense obscurity cover the
chief part of the field of view; but, at intervals, you may perceive
long, moving, dusky lines dividing these heavy masses, made visible by a
strange and unaccountable half illumination. As they sweep hurriedly by,
on their northward course, seemingly almost within reach from the mast
head, we are made painfully conscious that the wings of the tempest are
hovering over us in dangerous proximity.
Except the lamps in the binnacle, there is no obvious source of light
above or around us: yet the outlines of the vessel, with all the
labyrinth of spars and rigging, are dimly traceable in the murky air.
Whence do we derive this power of vision? you will naturally inquire.—A
glance at the surface of the water will explain it.
Every wave, as it combs and breaks, bears on its summit a high crest of
foam, visible at a great distance by its own moonlight, or soft silvery
radiation. Each little ripple carries its tiny lantern. Wherever the sea
is disturbed by the motion of the vessel, and especially at the bow,
where the waters are rudely disparted, or in the wake, where they rush
together violently as she shoots along, a gentle, milky light is broadly
diffused; and here and there a brilliant spark is seen beneath the
surface shining distinct and permanent, like a star submerged, or
gleaming and disappearing alternately, like the fire-flies of June.
The phosphorescence of the sea is unusually feeble at present, but it is
sufficient to prevent a total darkness, and by its aid we trace the dim
forms of surrounding objects, while a slight reflection from the clouds
betrays the threatening aspect of the weather.
Do you observe those singular luminous appearances resembling masses of
pale fire, or torch lights, hurrying from place to place, turning and
meandering in all directions, some feet beneath the waves, like comets
liberated from their proper spheres, and wandering without rule in the
abyss of waters? They are produced by fish that are playing about the
vessel, and were we adepts in the sport we might chance to strike one
with the grains by the glare of his own torch. But this requires the
skill and long experience of many voyages. To strike a fish by day is
difficult enough; for, even then, he is not to be found where he
appears. When you look obliquely from the vessel’s side at any object in
the water, refraction changes its apparent place to a much greater
distance than the real one, and brings the image nearer to the surface.
Success in reaching such an object requires your aim to be directed
towards a point considerably below the spot at which your game is seen.
At night the difficulty is much enhanced;—for it is not the fish itself
that emits the light. The agitation produced by his rapid motions
awakens the thousands of luminous animalcules swarming in every cubic
foot of water, and, as they fire their little tapers in succession, they
fall into the rear, while the fish darts onward under cover of the
obscurity, leaving a brilliant wake which serves but to deceive, or
sometimes to guide, his enemies, and to attract his prey.
But hark!—How the wind howls through the shrouds and whistles around
the slender rigging!—The gale increases, and another change comes over
the night scene. Do you observe how pitchy the gloom has grown to
windward?—All traces of the clouds in that direction are lost.—Ha!—A
flash of lightning!—Here it comes in earnest!—The pouring rain
obscures even the phosphoric glimmering of the waves, and now we have
“night and storm and darkness,” in all their terrible beauty! Who dares
attempt to paint the scene in words!—On every
hand,—above—around—within—all is confusion! The crew spring to their
stations, while the loud command and the scarce audible response are
mingled with the dash of waves, the roar of the blast, and the creaking
of the wracked timbers in one discordant, unintelligible burst of sound.
You stand, or rather _hang_ by the mizzen shrouds, the centre of an
invisible world where the maddened elements and hardy men contend for
life or conquest. You hear them, but you see them not,—save when the
electric flash tinges sea and cloud with momentary brilliance. Your eye
detects the foot of the nearest mast, but you endeavor in vain to trace
the tall spar upwards towards the lofty perch of those brave fellows on
the yard, whose shrill voices—heard as if from a mile in the distance,
in answer to the trumpet of the captain,—just reach the ear amid the
din of a thousand unearthly voices, and add to the wizard wildness of
the scene.
The storm swells loud and more loudly; but the yielding ship has risen
from the first awful impression of its force and now careers furiously
before it. The brailed but unfurled topsails flap with a dull and hollow
thunder, as they whirl and rebound under the restraint of the clue-lines
and the iron hands of the desperate crew. See that ghastly ball of
purple flame leaping from spar to spar, like the visible spirit of the
tempest![3]—Now it is on the foremast head,—now it glares on the
bowsprit,—and again, it springs to the mainyard and flashes full in the
face of you startled reefer, casting the hue of death over his boyish
features, rendered clearly visible for a moment in the demon torchlight.
The first flurry of the squall is passed;—we are again on a wind!—but
still wave follows wave, rolling on with an angry roar;—and each in
turn, as it reaches the vessel, strikes the bow with a resounding crash.
Every plank in the firmly-bolted hull trembles beneath the blow, while
the billow sweeps off under the lea, hissing and frothing in baffled
rage to find the gallant bark invulnerable to its power.—Ever and anon
the vivid lightning gilds the wide circle of a boiling sea, covered with
broad streaks of foam driven onward for miles in narrow belts before the
wind, while the sharp, sudden thunder follows on the instant, with a
single detonation, like the discharge of an enormous cannon. Here are no
hills and valleys to awake the long reverberating echoes—no solid earth
to fling back the war-note of the storm in proud defiance to the clouds!
The binnacle lamps are shining on a portion of the quarter-deck, and
light up the form of the helmsman at the wheel. Firm and unmoved amid
the elemental jar, he stands like a guardian spirit in the centre of an
illuminated sphere, contrasted so strongly with the palpable darkness
around, that the imponderable air itself is made to appear material and
tangible. On him depends our fate. One error!—one instance of momentary
neglect, and the mountain swell might overtop our oaken bulwarks,
leaving us a shattered and unmanagable wreck upon the desert waste of
waters!
But listen!—what mean those indescribable sounds making themselves
audible at intervals above the roar of the gale? Look out into the
gloom, and strive to penetrate the mingled rain and spray!
Do you not see from time to time, those undefined and monstrous
shapes,—blacker than night itself,—rising from the deep and giving
utterance to noises like the puff of a steam engine combined with the
snorting of some mammoth beast? Even here, while winds and waves are
raging—in this chaos of air and ocean, where the barriers of heaven and
earth seem broken down, and spray and foam—the sea—the rain—the
clouds—are whirled together in one wide mass of inextricable
confusion—_even here_, there are beings whose joy is in the tempest,
sporting their ungainly gambols—fearless of the scathing bolt and
glorying in the pealing thunder!
We are surrounded by an army of the grampus whales. Their breathing adds
a fiend-like wildness to the voices of the night,—and their dusky forms
looming through the obscurity as they thrust their misshapen backs above
the surface of the sea, give an almost infernal aspect to the scene, _if
scene that may be called which is but half perceived_ in dimness that
appears,
“Not light, but rather darkness visible.”
But come below!—We are happily exempt from the necessity of dangerous
exposure, and the force of the salt spray that has been driven in our
faces with stinging effect for the last half hour begins to weaken the
impression of this magnificent display of Omnipotence. Man would find
room for selfishness and vanity amid “the wreck of matter and the crush
of worlds.”—Your complexion is in danger! So if you would avoid the
hard looks of a weather-beaten tar, it is time to seek the shelter of
the cabin. There I can amuse you with pictures of other night scenes by
sea and land, until this short-lived tropical squall is over, or you
feel inclined to retire to your state room. In another hour we shall
probably be bounding along merrily, with all sail set, and the moon
beams sparkling and playing _hide-and-go-seek_ among the little rippling
waves with which a six-knot breeze roughens a subsiding swell!
-----
[2] The scene of this sketch is laid in the tropical Atlantic, between
the northern and southern trade-winds;—a region of calms and baffling
winds.
[3] The corposant, an electric ball or brush of light, sometimes
witnessed during storms at sea.
* * * * *
AGATHÈ.—A NECROMAUNT.
IN THREE CHIMERAS.
BY LOUIS FITZGERALD TASISTRO.
Chimera III.
Another moon! And over the blue night
She bendeth, like a holy spirit bright,
Through stars that veil them in their wings of gold;
As on she floateth with her image cold
Enamell’d on the deep, a sail of cloud
Is to her left, majestically proud!
Trailing its silver drapery away
In thin and fairy webs, that are at play
Like stormless waves upon a summer sea,
Dragging their length of waters lazily.
Ay! to the rocks! and thou wilt see, I wist,
A lonely one, that bendeth in the mist
Of moonlight, with a wide and raven pall
Flung round him.—Is he mortal man at all?
For, by the meagre firelight that is under
Those eyelids, and the vision shade of wonder
Falling upon his features, I would guess
Of one that wanders out of blessedness!
Julio! raise thee! By the holy mass!
I wot not of the fearless one would pass
Thy wizard shadow. Where the raven hair
Was shorn before, in many a matted layer
It lieth now; and on a rock beside
The sea, like merman at the ebb of tide,
Feasting his wondrous vision on decay,
So art thou gazing over Agathè!
Ah me! but this is never the fair girl,
With brow of light, as lovely as a pearl,
That was as beautiful as is the form
Of sea-bird at the breaking of a storm.
The eye is open, with convulsive strain—
A most unfleshly orb! the stars that wane
Have nothing of its hue; for it is cast
With sickly blood, and terribly aghast!
And sunken in its socket like the light
Of a red taper in the lonely night!
And there is not a braid of her bright hair
But lieth floating in the moonlight air,
Like the long moss beside a silver spring,
In elfin tresses, sadly murmuring.
The worm hath ’gan to crawl upon her brow—
The living worm! and with a ripple now,
Like that upon the sea, are heard below
The slimy swarms all ravening as they go,
Amid the stagnate vitals, with a crush;
And one might hear them echoing the hush
Of Julio, as he watches by the side
Of the dead ladye, his betrothéd bride!
And ever and anon a yellow group
Was creeping on her bosom, like a troop
Of stars, far up amid the galaxy,
Pale, pale, as snowy showers, and two or three
Were mocking the cold finger, round and round
With likeness of a ring; and, as they wound
About its bony girth, they had the hue
Of pearly jewels glistening in the dew.
That deathly stare! it is an awful thing
To gaze upon; and sickly thoughts will spring
Before it to the heart: it telleth how
There must be waste where there is beauty now.
The chalk! the chalk! where was the virgin snow
Of that once heaving bosom? even so,
The cold, pale dewy chalk, with yellow shade
Amid the leprous hues; and o’er it play’d
The straggling moonlight and the merry breeze,
Like two fair elves that by the murmuring seas
Woo’d smilingly together; but there fell
No life-gleam on the brow, all terrible
Becoming, through its beauty, like a cloud
That waneth paler even than a shroud,
All gorgeous and all glorious before;
For waste, like to the wanton night, was o’er
Her virgin features, stealing them away—
Ah me! ah me! and this is Agathè?
“Enough! enough! oh God! but I have pray’d
To thee, in early daylight and in shade,
And the mad-curse is on me still—and still!
I cannot alter the eternal will—
But—but—I hate thee Agathè! I hate
What lunacy hath made me consecrate:
I am _not_ mad!—_not now!_—I do not feel
That slumberous and blessed opiate steal
Up to my brain—oh! that it only would,
To people this eternal solitude
With fancies, and fair dreams, and summer-mirth,
Which is not now—and yet my mother earth
I would not love to lie above thee so
As Agathè lies there—Oh! no! no! no!
To have these clay worms feast upon my heart!
And all the light of being to depart
Into a dismal shadow! I could die
As the red lightnings, quenching amid sky
Their wild and wizard breath; I could away
Like a blue billow bursting into spray:
But never—never have corruption here
To feed her worms and let the sunlight jeer
Above me so. ’Tis thou! I owe thee, moon,
To-night’s fair worship; so be lifting soon
Thy veil of clouds, that I may kneel as one
That seeketh for thy virgin benison!”
He gathers the cold limpets as they creep
On the gray rocks beside the lonely deep,
And with a flint breaks through into the shell,
And feeds him—by the mass! he feasteth well.
And he hath lifted water in a clam
And tasted sweetly from a stream that swam
Down to the sea; and now is turn’d away
Again, again, to gaze on Agathè!
There is a cave upon that isle—a cave
Where dwelt a hermit-man: the winter wave
Roll’d to its entrance, casting a bright mound
Of snowy shells and fairy pebbles round;
And over were the solemn ridges strewn
Of a dark rock, that, like the wizard throne
Of some sea-monarch, stood, and from it hung
Wild thorn and bramble in confusion flung
Amid the startling crevices—like sky
Through gloom of clouds, that sweep in thunder by.
A cataract fell over, in a streak
Of silver, playing many a wanton freak;
Midway, and musical, with elfin glee
It bounded in its beauty to the sea,
Like dazzling angel vanishing away.
In sooth, ’twas pleasant in the moonlight gray
To see that fairy fountain leaping so,
Like one that knew not wickedness nor woe!
The hermit had his cross and rosary:
I ween like other hermits so was he,
A holy man and frugal, and at night
He prayed, or slept, or, sometimes, by the light
Of the fair moon went wandering beside
The lonely sea, to hear the silver tide
Rolling in gleesome music to the shore;
The more he heard he loved to hear the more.
And there he is, his hoary beard adrift
To the night winds, that sportingly do lift
Its snow-white tresses; and he leaneth on
A rugged staff, all weakly and alone,
A childless, friendless man!
He is beside
The ghastly Julio and his ghastlier bride.
’Twas wond’rous strange to gaze upon the two!
And the old hermit felt a throbbing through
His pulses—“Holy Virgin! save me, save!”
He deem’d of spectre from the midnight wave,
And cross’d him thrice, and pray’d and pray’d again:
“Hence! hence!” and Julio started as the strain
Of exorcisms fell faintly on his ear:
“I knew thee, father, that thou beest here
To gaze upon this girl, as I have been.
By yonder moon! it was a frantic sin
To worship so an image of the clay;
It was like beauty—but is now away—
What lived upon her features, like the light
On yonder cloud, all tender and all bright;
But it is faded as the other must,
And she that was all beauty is all dust.
“Father! thy hand upon this brow of mine
And tell me is it cold? But she will twine
No wreath upon these temples—never, never!
For there she lieth like a streamless river
That stagnates in its bed. Feel, feel me here,
If I be madly throbbing in the fear
For that cold slimy worm. Ay! look and see
How dotingly it feeds, how pleasantly!
And where it is have been the living hues
Of beauty, purer than the very dews.
So, father! seest thou that yonder moon
Will be on wane to-morrow, soon and soon?
And I, that feel my being wear away,
Shall droop beside to darkness: so, but say
A prayer for the dead, when I am gone
And let the azure tide that floweth on
Cover us lightly with its murmuring surf,
Like a green sward of melancholy turf;
Thou mayest, if thou wilt, thou mayest rear
A cenotaph on this lone island here,
Of some rude mossy stone, below a tree,
And carve an olden rhyme for her and me
Upon its brow.”
He bends, and gazes yet
Before his ghastly bride! the anchoret
Sate by him, and hath press’d a cross of wood
To his wan lips * * *
* * * * * *
* * * * * *
“My son! look up and tell thy dismal tale.
Thou seemest cold, and sorrowful, and pale.
Alas! I fear that thou hast strangely been
A child of curse, and misery, and sin.
And this,—is she thy sister?”—“nay! my bride.”
“Anon! and thou?”—“True, true! but then she died,
And was a virgin, and is virgin still,
Chaste as the moon, that taketh her pure fill
Of light from the great sun. But now, go by,
And leave me to my madness, or to die!
This heart, this brain are sore.—Come, come, and fold
Me round, ye hydra billows! wrapt in gold,
That are so writhing your eternal gyres
Before the moon, which, with a myriad tiars
Is crowning you, as ye do fall and kiss
Her pearly feet, that glide in blessedness!
Let me be torture-eaten, ere I die!
Let me be mangled sore with agony!
And be so cursed; so stricken by the spell
Of my heart’s frenzy, that a living hell
Be burning there!—back! back if thou art mad—
Methought thou wast, but thou art only sad.
Is this thy child, old man? look, look, and see!
In truth it is a piteous thing for thee
To become childless—well a-well, go by!
Is there no grave? The quiet sea is nigh,
And I will bury her below the moon:
It may be but a trance or midnight swoon.
And she may wake. Wake, Ladye! ha! methought
It was like _her_.—Like her! and is it not?
My angel girl? my brain, my stricken brain!—
I know thee now!—I know myself again.”