softly out of the surrounding void, and alighted daintily upon this
glistening earth-bud with a sweet, low chirp of content that also
sounded like a note of welcome. With delicate, mincing steps the
graceful visitor pattered over the crisp sand, prying with keen black
eyes and fine, nervous beak into every cranny and worm-hole, and
finding apparently many a tasty morsel to reward her visit. Evening
brought another guest on family cares intent,--a huge turtle, whose
broad, buckler-like carapace rose shining out of the limpid wave
like the dome of some naiad’s pearly palace under the silvern glow
of the broad moon. But instinct, that infallible guide to the lesser
intelligences of animate creation, warned the expectant parent that
here, for some time at any rate, no safe _cache_ might be found for the
deposit of those precious round eggs of hers. So, after a leisurely
survey of the scanty circlet, she dragged her huge bulk lingeringly
into the clear waters again, and was immediately transformed from a
crawling reptile into a swift and graceful creature that cleft the
waves like an arrow. Thenceforward many visitants came and went,
birds, crustacea, and fish, most of them exchanging benefits with the
new land, although any nascent germs of vegetation lay biding their
appointed time until the sea should finally refrain from flinging an
occasional lustration across the smiling face of the new-born islet. In
due process of the suns, however, a wandering coco-nut came with many a
backward sweep and much dallying upon the outskirts of the surrounding
reef among the bewildering eddies, until at last a friendly wavelet
caught it and spun it up high and dry, where it lay at rest, kept from
rolling seaward again by a little ridge left in the sand, the impress
of a more than usually vigorous breaker. In that soft scene of mild
delight day succeeded day like the passing of a sunny afternoon dream,
undisturbed by any clamorous voice of wind or hoarse note of ravin from
the sea. Balmy airs, like the sweet breath of love, scarcely dimpled
the serene face of the blue ocean around. In a beneficent flood the
golden sunshine lavished its treasures upon the lonely ocean beneath by
day, and by night the unaging glory of the silver stars, among whose
countless hosts the quiet beauty of the lovely moon pursued her stately
way, was perfectly reproduced in the same limitless mirror.
Beneath these gentle, yet irresistible, influences that solitary
coco-nut felt its dim interior ferment with life. And out from the
dead dryness of its husk sprang two slender arms; tender, beseeching
things of a living green in almost startling contrast to the withered,
storm-tossed envelope from whence they had emerged. In obedience to
some hidden impulse one of them bent downwards and by slow persistence
wrought its way into the sand, while the other lifted itself erect and
presently unfolded a delicate green fan. Unwatched, unadmired, save by
that Infinite Intelligence that fills the remotest corners of earth and
sea with loveliness for Its own delight, the tiny tree strengthened
daily, mooring itself ever deeper by spreading rootlets that reached
down through the interstices of the reef beneath, and raising higher
and higher in perfect beauty its feathery fronds of palest green, the
earliest pioneer of the vegetable kingdom in this youthful patch of
Mother Earth. After a while, as the coast-line extended and more of
the dry land held its own against the engirdling deep, other plants of
lower stature, but equal charm, managed to find a congenial root-hold
in this seemingly barren patch of sand. Humble as they were, they gave
to the islet the friendly tint that all eyes love, and made it more
complete. Several migrant sea-birds halted here, and, finding the spot
exactly suited to their needs, made it their home, laying their large
eggs barely upon the smooth sand, and rearing in happy aloofness from
all enemies their voracious broods. Turtles no longer disdained the
scanty beach as a safe hatching place for their plentiful stores of
eggs, and strange waifs from far-away lands were arrested in their
weary oscillations about the never-resting ocean and peacefully brought
here to a final abiding-place.
So fared the uneventful, unnoted procession of days, months, and years,
until one morning the now abundant, happy life of the island awoke,
as was its wont, at the first warm breath of a new day. A soft blush
of indescribable colour-blends replaced the dark violet of the night
sky, whose shadows retreated before that conquering dawn as if in haste
to allow the advent of its coming glory. Soon, heralded by spears,
streamers, and sheaves of shining gold, the majestic silence of his
entry smiting the waiting hemisphere like the trump of an archangel,
the great sun rose. His first level rays glided across the glowing sea
and fell upon the wan, upturned face of a man, flung like any other
fragment of jetsam up from the heaving bosom of the Pacific, and left
apparently lifeless on the sand near the trunk of the now sturdy tree.
Under that loving touch of reviving warmth the pale, set features
relaxed, a shudder as if of re-entering vitality shook the gaunt limbs,
and presently the eyes unclosed. The first human visitor to the island
sat up and stared vacantly around. His upturned eyes caught sight of
the great green bunches of delicious young fruit hanging some twenty
feet above his head, and the sight was tantalising beyond measure
to his leathery, cracking tongue and throat. He was far too weak to
attempt such a task as climbing the tree would have been; but a few of
the eggs that lay near soon supplied him with fresh vigour, although
the outraged birds protested all they knew against this strange
experience, unlike anything hitherto troubling their peaceful life.
But as the man grew stronger his proceedings troubled the original
freeholders more and more. For he collected a great heap of driftwood,
including the mast of his own vessel, upon which he had been borne
hither, and presently from out of the midst of the heap arose a heavy
black pillar of smoke. Then through the smoke burst flashes of fire,
before which all but those birds with young, whom no terrors would
have driven them from, fled shrieking away. As the man grew stronger
he climbed the tree, and drank greedily from the sweet liquid filling
the young nuts; but while he sat there among the far-spreading leaves,
he saw a sight that touched him deeper than would the most beautiful
Nature picture in the world,--a schooner making for the island. They
had seen his smoke-pillar at a great distance and altered their course
to his rescue. So he went away, leaving behind him a terrible memory
as of the ravages of some unthinkable monster whose visit had changed,
not only the face of Nature, but all the habits and customs of the
island-folk.
IX
A SUBMARINE EARTHQUAKE
There was a delicate tint of green over all the sky instead of its
usual deep, steadfast blue. All around the horizon the almost constant
concomitants of the Trade winds, fleecy masses of cumuli, were lying
peacefully, their shape unaltered from hour to hour. Their usual snowy
whiteness, however, was curiously besmirched by a shading of dirty
brown which clung around their billowy outlines, giving them a stale
appearance greatly at variance with the normal purity of these lovely
cloud-forms. The afternoon sun, gliding swiftly down the shining slope
of heaven toward the western edge of that placid sea, had an air of
mystery about his usually glorious disc, a wondrous glow of unnameable
tints that, streaming away from him into the clear firmament, encircled
him with a halo of marvellous shades, all lacking the palpitating
brightness usually inseparable from solar displays near the Equator.
And over the sea-surface also was spread, as upon a vast palette, great
splashes of colour, untraceable to any definite source, mysterious
in their strange beauty. At irregular intervals, across that silent
expanse of peaceful limpidity, came, in stately onset, an undulating
throb of ocean’s heart,--a shining knoll of water one hundred leagues
in length, but so mobile, so gentle in its gliding incidence, that
it was beautiful as the heaving bosom of a sleeping naiad. The very
silence, deep and solemn as that of the stellar spaces, was sweet,--a
peaceful sweetness that fell upon the soul like the most exquisite
music, and soothed as does a dreamless sleep.
And yet, in spite of the indescribable charm of that divine day, there
was on board the solitary ship that gave the needed touch of human
interest to that ocean Elysium a general air of expectancy, a sense
of impending change which as yet could not be called uneasiness, and
still was indefinably at variance with the more manifest influences
that made for rest of mind and body. The animals on board, pigs and
cats and fowls, were evidently ill at ease. Their finer perceptions,
unbiassed by reasoning appreciation of Nature’s beauties, were
palpably disturbed, and they roamed restlessly about, often composing
themselves as if to sleep, only to resume their agitated prowling
almost immediately. Lower sank the sun, stranger and more varied grew
the colour-schemes in sky and sea. Up from the Eastern horizon crept
gradually a pale glow as of a premature dawn, the breaking of an
interpolated day shed by some visitant sun from another system. The
moon was not yet due for six hours, so that none could attribute this
unearthly radiance to her rising. Busy each with the eager questionings
of his own perturbed mind, none spoke a word as the sun disappeared,
but watched in suspense that was almost pain the brightening of this
spectral glare. Suddenly, as if reflected from some unimaginable
furnace, the zenith was all aflame. That fiery glow above turned the
sea into the semblance of a lake of blood, and horror distorted every
face. The still persisting silence now lay like the paralysis of a
trance upon all, and an almost frantic desire for sound racked them to
the core.
At last, when it seemed as if the tension of their nerves had almost
reached the snapping point, there was an overwhelming sulphurous
stench, followed by a muttering as of thunder beneath the sea. A
tremendous concussion below the keel made the stout hull vibrate
through every beam, and the tall masts quivered like willow twigs
in a squall. The air was full of glancing lights, as if legions of
fire-flies disported themselves. Slowly the vessel began to heave
and roll, but with an uncertain staggering motion, unlike even the
broken sea of a cyclone centre. Gradually that dreadful light faded
from the lurid sky, and was replaced by a smoky darkness, alien to
the overshadowing gloom of any ordinary tempest. Strange noises arose
from the deep, not to be compared with any of the manifold voices of
the ocean so well known to those who do business in great waters.
And the myriad brightnesses which make oceans’ depths so incomparably
lovely throughout the tropical nights were all gone. All was dark
beneath as above. Not only so, but those anxious mariners could feel,
though they could not see, that while the atmospheric ocean was calm
almost to stagnation, the hidden deeps under them were being rent
and disintegrated by such an unthinkable storm as the air had never
witnessed. The fountains of the great deep were broken up, but the
floods issuing therefrom were of cosmic flame, able to resolve even
that immensity of superincumbent ocean into its original gases and
change the unchangeable.
Tossing helplessly upon that tortured sea, face to face with those
elemental forces that only to think of makes the flesh shrink on
the bones like a withered leaf, the men suffered the passage of the
hours. What was happening or was about to happen they could only dimly
imagine. They could but endure in helplessness and hope for the day.
Yet their thoughts would wander to those they loved, wondering dimly
whether the catastrophe apparently impending was to be universal and
the whole race of man about to be blotted out,--whether the world were
dying. What _they_ suffered could not be told, but the animals died.
Perhaps the scorching heat-waves which continually arose, making mouths
and nostrils crack like burnt leather, and cauterising taste and smell
as if with the fumes of molten sulphur, had slain the beasts. The
discovery of this ghastly detail of the night’s terrors did not add
much to their fears. It could not; for the mind of man can only contain
a limited amount of terror, as the body can only feel a limited amount
of pain, which is something to be deeply thankful for.
Shortly after midnight there was a deafening uproar, a hissing as of
the Apocalyptic Star being quenched, and immediately the gloom became
filled with steam, an almost scalding fog, through which as through a
veil came a red sheen. At the same time a mighty swell swept toward
them from east to west, striking the ship full in the stem. Gallantly
she rose to the advancing wall of water until she seemed upreared
upon her stern, but in spite of her wonderful buoyancy a massive sea
broke on board, clearing the decks like a besom of destruction. Down
the receding slope of this gigantic billow she fled, as if plunging
headlong to the sea-bed, and before she had time to recover herself
was met by another almost as huge. Clinging for life to such fragments
as still held on the clean-swept decks, the crew felt that at last
all was over. But the good ship survived the third wave, being then
granted a brief respite before another series appeared. This allowed
all hands a breathing space, and an opportunity to notice that there
was a healthier smell in the air, and that the terror-striking noises
were fast dying away. When the next set of rollers came thundering
along they were far less dangerous than before, nor, although they
made a clean breach over the much-enduring ship, were they nearly as
trying to the almost worn-out crew. And now, breaking through the
appalling drapery that had hidden the bright face of the sky, suddenly
shone the broad smile of the silver moon. Like the comforting face of
a dear friend, that pleasant sight brought renewed hope and vigour
to all. Again the cheery voices of the officers were heard, and all
wrought manfully to repair the damage done by the terrible sea. One
by one the glittering stars peeped out as the gloomy canopy melted
away, revealing again the beautiful blue of the sky. A gentle breeze
sprang up, but for awhile it was only possible to lay the ship’s head
approximately on her course, because the compasses were useless. The
needles had temporarily lost their polarity in the seismic disturbance
that had taken place beneath them. But that was a small matter. As long
as the celestial guides were available, the navigators could afford to
wait until, with the rest of Nature’s forces, magnetism regained its
normal conditions. So, during the energetic labours of the men, the
morning quickly came, hailed by them as a sight they had never again
expected to see. And what a dawn it was. Surely never had the abundant
day been so delightful, the heaven so stainless, the air so pure. All
the more because of the extraordinary contrast between sky and sea; for
old ocean was utterly unlike any sea they had ever before sailed upon.
As far as the eye could reach the surface was covered with floating
pumice, so that the vessel grated through it as if ploughing over a
pebbly beach. Wherever the water could be seen it was actually muddy,
befouled like any ditch. Dead fish, floating and distorted, added to
the ugliness of what overnight was so beautiful. Most pathetic of all,
perhaps, upon that dead sea was the sight of an occasional spot of
white, a tiny patch of ruffled feathers floating, that had been one
of the fearless winged wanderers who add so much to the beauty of the
sea, its joyous life quenched by the poisonous fumes of the submarine
earthquake.
X
THE SILENT WARFARE OF THE SUBMARINE WORLD
All imaginative minds are inevitably impressed by the solemn grandeur
of the sea. Some shudder at its awful loneliness, its apparent
illimitability, its air of brooding, ageless mystery in calm. Others
are most affected by its unchainable energy, the terror of its gigantic
billows, its immeasurable destructiveness in storms. Yet others, a
less numerous class, ponder over its profundities of rayless gloom and
uniform cold, where incalculable pressures bear upon all bodies, so
that cylinders of massive steel are flattened into discs, and water
percolates through masses of metal as though they were of muslin.
But there is yet another aspect of the oceanic wonders that engages
the meditations of comparatively few, and this is perhaps the most
marvellous of them all.
Placid and reposeful, tempest-tossed or current-whirled, the
unchangeable yet unresting surface of the ocean reveals to the voyager
no inkling of what is going on below its mobile mask, and even when
furrowed deepest by the mighty but invisible ploughshare of the storm,
how slight is the effect felt twenty feet deep. Yet in those soundless
abysses of shade beneath the waves a war is being incessantly waged
which knows no truce, ruthless, unending, and universal. On earth the
struggle for existence is a terrible one, exciting all our sympathies
when we witness its pitilessness, being ourselves by some happy
accident outside the area. Nature, “red in tooth and claw,” weeding
out the unfit by the operation of her inexorable laws, raises many a
doubting question in gentle souls as to why all this suffering should
be necessary. They see but a portion of the reversed pattern woven
by the eternal looms. But the fauna of the land are by an enormous
majority herbivorous, mild in their habits, and terrified at the
sight of blood. Even the carnivora, fierce and ravenous as are their
instincts, do not devour one another except in a few insignificant and
abnormal cases, such as wolves driven mad by starvation. Much less do
they eat their own offspring, although there are many instances of this
hideous appetite among the herbivores, which are familiar to most of us.
In striking contrast to these conditions, the tribes of ocean are all
devourers of each other, and, with the exception of the mammalia and
the sharks, make no distinction in favour of their own fruit. One
single instance among the inhabitants of the sea furnishes us with a
variation. The halicore, dugong, or manatee (_Sirenia_), now nearly
extinct, are, without doubt, eaters of herbage only. This they gather
along the shores whose waters are their habitat, or cull from the
shallow sea bottoms. For all the rest, they are mutually dependent upon
each other’s flesh for life, unscrupulous, unsatisfied, and vigorous
beyond belief. “Væ Victis” is their motto, and the absence of all
other food their sole and sufficient excuse. Viewed dispassionately,
this law of interdependence direct is a beneficent one in spite of its
apparent cruelty. Vast as is the sea, the fecundity of most of its
denizens is well known to be so great that without effective checks
always in operation it must rapidly become putrid and pestilential from
the immense accumulation of decaying animal matter. As things are, the
life of a herring, for instance, from first to last is a series of
miraculous escapes. As ova, their enemies are so numerous, even their
own parents greedily devouring the quickening spawn, that it is hard
to understand how any are overlooked and allowed to become fish. Yet
as fry, after providing food for countless hordes of hungry foes, they
are still sufficiently numerous to impress the imagination as being
in number like the sands of the sea. And so, always being devoured
by millions, they progress towards maturity, at which perhaps one
billionth of those deposited as ova arrive. This infinitesimal remnant
is a mighty host requiring such supplies of living organisms for its
daily food as would make an astronomer dizzy to enumerate. And every
one is fat and vigorous; must be, since none but the fittest can have
survived. Their glittering myriads move in mysteriously ordered march
along regular routes, still furnishing food for an escort of insatiable
monsters such as whales, sharks, etc.; while legions of sea-fowl above
descend and clamorously take their tiny toll. In due season they arrive
within the range of man. He spreads his nets and loads his vessels,
but all his spoils, however great they may appear to him, are but the
crumbs of the feast, the skimmings of the pot.
This marvellous system of supply and demand is, of course, seen in its
highest development near land, or at any rate where the bed of the sea
is comparatively near the surface, as on the Banks of Newfoundland,
the Agulhas Banks, and many others. But in the deepest waters of
the ocean, far from any shore, there are immense numbers of swift
predatory fish, such as the bonito, the dolphin (_coryphæna_), and
the albacore. Mammalia also, like the porpoise, grampus, and rorqual,
require enormous supplies of fish for their sustenance, and never fail
to find them. As we ascend the scale of size the struggle becomes
majestic--a war of Titans, such as no arena on earth has seen since the
Deluge. The imagination recoils dismayed before the thought of such a
spectacle as is afforded by the gigantic cachalot descending to the
murky depths where in awful state the hideous Kraken broods. No other
name befits this inexpressible monster as well as the old Norse epithet
bestowed in bygone days upon the greatest of the mollusca by terrified
fisher-folk of Scandinavia. Vast, formless, and insatiable, he crouches
in those fathomless silences like the living embodiment of sin, an
ever-craving abysmal mouth surrounded by a Medusa-like web of unresting
arms. His enormous flaccid bulk needs a continual holocaust to supply
its flood of digestive juices, and that need is abundantly supplied.
Then comes the doughty leviathan from above, and in noiseless majesty
of power, disdaining subterfuge, rushes straight to the attack, every
inch of his great frame mutely testifying to the enormous pressure of
the superincumbent sea. Sometimes, stifling for air, the whale rises to
the surface dragging upward his writhing prey, though almost as bulky
as himself. In his train follow the lesser monsters eager for their
share, and none of the fragments are lost.
But see the grampus hurl himself like some flying elephant into the
“brown” of a school of scared porpoises. In vain do they flee at
headlong speed anywhither. The enemy pursues, he overtakes, he swallows
at a gulp, even as do his victims the lesser creatures upon which they
fatten in their turn. So with the huge mackerel, which seamen call the
albacore, although as far as one can see there is no difference between
him and the tunny of the Mediterranean but in size. What havoc he makes
among a school of his congeners the bonito! A hungry lion leaping into
the midst of a flock of deer will seize one, and retire to devour it
quietly. But this monster clashes his jaws continually as he rushes to
and fro among the panic-stricken hosts, scattering their palpitating
fragments around him in showers. In like manner do his victims play
the destroyers’ part in their turn. Yonder flight of silvery creatures
whose myriads cast a dense shade over the bright sea are fleeing for
life, for beneath them, agape for their inevitable return, are the
serried ranks of their ravenous pursuers. Birds intercept the aerial
course of the fugitives, who are in evil case indeed whithersoever they
flee. But descending the scale, we shall find the persecuted _Exoceta_
also on the warpath in their thousands after still smaller prey.
Time would fail to tell of the ravages of the swordfish, also a
mackerel of great size and ferocity, who launches himself torpedo-like
at the bulky whale, the scavenger-shark, or a comrade, with strict
impartiality. And of the “killer” whale, eater of the tongue only of
the mysticetus; the thresher-shark, aider and abettor of the killer; or
the saw-fish, who disembowels his prey that his feeble teeth may have
tender food. Their warfare knows no armistice; they live but to eat and
be eaten in their turn, and as to eat they must fight, the battle rages
evermore. The dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of
cruelty, but they are peaceful compared with the sombre depths of the
sea.
XI
AN EFFECT OF REFRACTION