PART III.
With pallid check, dishevelled hair, and wildly gleaming eyes,
Once more before the banquetters, a fearful phantom flies!
Once more at Herod’s feet it falls, and cold with nameless dread
The wondering monarch bends to hear. A voice, as from the dead,
From those pale lips, shrieks madly forth,—“Thy promise, king, I claim,
And if the grant be foulest guilt,—not mine,—not mine the blame!
Quick, quick recall that reckless vow, or strike thy dagger here,
Ere yet this voice demand a gift that chills my soul with fear!
Heaven’s curse upon the fatal grace that idly charmed thine eyes!
Oh! better had I ne’er been born than be the sacrifice!
The word I speak will blanch thy cheek, if human heart be thine,
It was a fiend in human form that murmured it to mine.
To die for me! a thoughtless child! for me must blood be shed!
Bend low,—lest angels hear me ask!—oh! God!—the Baptist’s head!”
THE LIGHTNING OF THE WATERS.
———
BY DR. REYNELL COATES.
———
There are few phenomena observable on the ocean, more striking than the phosphorescence of the water, when seen in high perfection. It has forcibly attracted the attention of poets and philosophers in all ages, and many and curious have been the speculations of those who have endeavored to explain the brilliant apparition. In later times, however, the progress of natural science has dissipated the mystery to a considerable extent, destroying a portion of its romantic interest, without, thereby, diminishing its exquisite beauty.
We are well informed, at present, that all the brilliant pyrotechny of Neptune is the effect of animal secretion, not differing essentially in cause from that which ornaments our groves and meadows, when the glow-worms of Europe, the fire-flies of North America, or the fulgoure of the Indies are lighting their fairy love-lanterns beneath the cool, green leaves, or filling the air with their mimic meteors.
To those who are not familiar with microscopic researches, it may seem almost impossible that animal life can be multiplied to such excess in the transparent waters, where not a mote is visible by daylight, as to give rise to the broad and bright illumination of the sea, so frequently observed within the lower latitudes; and many, for this reason, have attributed these night-fires of the deep to the impurity and occasional fermentation of the ocean,—a cause which they esteem more nearly commensurate with the magnificence of the result. Such theorists regard this phosphorescence as similar to that so constantly produced by putrifying fish and decaying wood.
These ideas, as I have stated, are no longer tenable, and the real origin of the phenomenon is better understood. But even now, the few who have witnessed it in full extent, variety, and grandeur—a privilege rarely enjoyed, except by those who have made long voyages, and have become familiar with many seas—are lost in wonder; and, unless professionally devoted to the study of natural history, they find it difficult to credit the assertion, that all these vast displays are mere results of living action.
It may prove interesting, then, to those who are fond of such investigations, to offer some remarks on the multitudinous character of those tribes of simple and transparent beings, which swarm about the surface of the ocean, and may be found continually changing in race and habits, with almost every degree of latitude we traverse.
If you will take the trouble, on some suitable occasion during the month of November or December, to descend into a fashionable oyster cellar, and ask admission to the pile of freshly opened shells stowed in the usual receptacle, which is in some dark vault or closet about the premises, you may chance to witness, on a diminutive scale, the far-famed phosphorescence of the sea, without enduring the heavy immigration tax levied, with unrelenting severity, by the old trident-bearer upon all novices, except, perhaps, a few fortunate favorites.
Take up the shovel that leans against the wall, order the light removed and the door closed, and then proceed to disturb the shells. If they have been taken from the water, where it is purely salt,—and still more certainly if gathered from the beds of blue marine mud that are the favorite resort of the finest oysters—the moment you throw a shovelful upon the top of the pile, the whole mass, jarred by the blow, will become spangled with hundreds of brilliant stars—not in this case pale and silvery, but of the richest golden-green or blue. None of these stars may equal in size the head of the finest pin; but so intense is the light emitted by them, that a single, and scarcely visible point will sometimes illuminate an inch of the surrounding surface, even casting shadows from the little spears of sea-grass growing in its neighborhood.
Choose one of the most conspicuous of these diminutive tapers, and, without removing it from the shell, carry it towards the gas-lamp. As you approach, the brilliancy of the star declines; and when the full flood of light is thrown upon the shell, it nearly, or entirely disappears. If you press your finger rudely upon the spot, you will again perceive the luminous matter diffused, like a fluid, over the surrounding surface, and shining, for an instant, more brightly than ever, even under the immediate glare of the gas. Then all is over. You have crushed one of the glow-worms of the deep—an animal, once probably as vain of his golden flame as you of any of your brilliant endowments—perhaps some sentinel there stationed to alarm his sleeping brethren of the approach of danger—perhaps an animalcular Hero trimming her solitary lamp to guide her chosen one, through more than Leander’s dangers, along the briny path to her rocky bower, beset by all the microscopic monsters of the corallines! At all events, despise it as you may, this little being was possessed of life, susceptible of happiness, and endowed with power to outshine, with inborn lustre, the richest gem in Europe’s proudest diadem!
The sea is filled in many regions, and at various seasons, with incalculable multitudes of living creatures, in structure much resembling this little parasite, but often vastly more imposing in dimensions. The smallest tribes that are able to call attention to their individual existence generally wander, like erratic stars, beneath the waves. They may be seen by thousands shooting past the vessel, on evenings when the moon is absent or obscured, suddenly lighting their torches when the motion of the bow produces a few curling swells and breakers on either hand, and whirling from eddy to eddy, as they sweep along the side and are lost in the wake. From time to time the vessel, in her progress, disturbs some large being of similar powers, who instantly ejects a trail of luminous fluid which, twining, and waving about among contending currents, assumes the semblance of a silver snake. But the most surprising of all proofs of the infinity of life is furnished by those inconceivably numerous bands of shining animalcules, too small for human vision, which in their aggregate effect perform, perhaps, the grandest part in beautifying the night scene on the ocean.
The crest of every wave emits a pale and milky light and every ripple that, urged onward too rapidly before the breeze, expires in spreading its little patch of foam upon the water, increases the mysterious brightness. On a starless evening the novice may find it very difficult to account for the distinctness with which even the distant billows may be traced by their whitened summits, while every other object is thrown into the deepest shade. The gentle radiation from within the foam deceives the eye:—it seems a mere reflection from the surface; and he turns again and again towards the heavens, with the constantly renewed impression, that the moon has found some transient opening in the cloudy canopy through which descends a thin pencil of rays to be glinted back from the edges of the waves.
Though certain portions of the ocean, generally, present but slender proofs of phosphorescence,—such being peculiarly the case within the gloomy limits of the Gulf Stream, for reasons not to be appropriately mentioned here—yet no observing person can have passed a week upon the ocean, or rowed his skiff by night on any of our principal harbors, without becoming familiar with most of the appearances to which allusion has been made. A mere voyage to Europe frequently presents much grander examples; but he who would enjoy the view of the phenomenon in its fullest glory, must “cross earth’s central line” “and brave the stormy spirit of the Cape.”
Let me transport you for a few moments into the midst of the Indian Ocean! The sultry sun of February has been basking all day upon the heated waters from a brassy sky without a cloud—the vapors of the upper regions resembling a thin veil of dust, fiery and glowing, as if recently ejected from the mouth of some vast furnace! But the tyrant has gone to his repose, and we enjoy some respite from his scorching influence. It is not cool, but the temperature is tolerable, and this is much! Leave the observation of the barometer to the captain! You cannot prevent a hurricane, should it be impending. Then trust such cares to those in whom is vested the responsibility, and come on deck with me.
There is no moon—but the “sentinel stars” are all at their post. Observe those broad flashes reflected upward from beneath the bows, and playing brightly upon the jib! At every plunge of the vessel, as she sinks into the trough of the sea, you might read a volume fluently by that mild radiance; and beautiful indeed is the view from the fore stay-sail nettings, looking down upon the curling wreaths on either side of the cut-water, and the long lines of foam thrown off by the swell as the vessel gracefully breasts the coming wave, all glowing like molten silver intermingled with a thousand diamonds!
But I will not lead you thitherward—a noble sight awaits us in our wake. Step to the stern and lean with me over the taffrail. What a glorious vision! For miles abaft, our course presents one long and wide canal of living light—the clear, blue ocean, transparent as air, filling it to repletion; while the darker waters around appear like some dense medium through which superior spirits have constructed this magic path-way for us and us alone, so nicely are its breadth and depth adjusted to the form of our gallant bark. Has not the galaxy been torn from heaven, and whelmed beneath the waves to form that burning road? No! no! Though thousands of bright orbs are set in that nether firmament to strengthen the delusion, yet it cannot be. Night’s stormy cincture never gleamed like this, nor bore such dazzling gems. There it still glimmers with its myriad sparks, athwart the dark blue vault, paled by the radiance of its sea-born rival, while huge globes of fire roll from beneath the keel, and blaze along the silvery track like showers of wandering meteors, but all too gentle in their aspect to be deemed of evil-augury.
Those stars are literally living stars,—that ocean galaxy is formed of living beings only,—and even those meteors, invisible by day, except when they approach unusually near to the surface, are active in pursuit of prey. Observe one closely, and you perceive its motions. Formed like a great umbrella of transparent jelly, with fibres, yards in length, trailing from its margin, and the handle carved into a beautiful group of leaves, it flaps its way regularly through the water with a stately march, and wo to the unfortunate creature that becomes involved in the meshes of its stinging tendrils.
This is no exaggerated picture, for such are the beautiful phenomena occasionally witnessed in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. The animals upon whose agency they are dependent, generally become invisible by daylight in consequence of their transparency; but there are certain tribes among them whose peculiar structure renders them conspicuous: and of these one of the most remarkable is known to naturalists by the title of Salpa.
There are many species of the salpæ, but they bear a closer likeness to each other than do most of these simple tribes of being. In form they all resemble diminutive purses, composed of highly transparent jelly, with wide mouths like the ordinary clasp—and strengthened by a net-work of ribbons interwoven with the general texture of the purse. These are designed to supply the place of muscles. The salpæ move through the water by contracting the net-work, so as to render the cavity smaller and expel the water from it with some force; then, relaxing the fibres, they allow their natural elasticity to expand them to their original form; thus drawing in a fresh supply of fluid with which to renew the effort. In this manner they are driven onward, always retreating from the principal orifice of the sac. But I will not detain you with a detailed description of their singular organization. It is enough for our present purpose to state that near the bottom of the purse, within the thickness of its walls, there is a golden spot, as if a solitary coin was there deposited. This spot alone enables us to see the animal distinctly when floating in the water.
When young, these little creatures adhere together in strings or cords arranged like the leaflets of a pinnated leaf, in consecutive pairs, to the number of twenty or more. At that period, the most common species in the South Atlantic rarely exceed one half an inch in length, and the yellow spot hardly equals in size an ordinary grain of sand; yet, in certain regions of the ocean these salpæ swarm in such inconceivable multitudes that the sea assumes the appearance of a sandy shoal for miles in length and breadth. To the depth of many fathoms their delicate bodies are closely huddled together, until the constant repetition of the diminutive colored spots renders the water perfectly opaque, and so increases its consistence that the lighter ripple of the surface breaks upon the edge of the animated bank, while the heavier billows roll on smoothly, with the regular and more majestic motion of the ground swell. In passing through such tracts the speed of the vessel is sometimes sensibly checked by the increased resistance of the medium in which she moves; and when a bucket full of brine is lifted from the sea, it may contain a larger portion of living matter than of the fluid in which it floats.
There can be no reasonable doubt that most of those false shoals which disfigure the older charts—their existence proved upon authorities of known veracity and denied by others no less credible—have really been laid down by navigators who have met with beds of salpæ, and were ignorant of their true nature.
I have never seen these animals emitting light, but it is well known that many phosphorescent animalcules shine only in certain stages of the weather or at certain seasons of the year: and as several distinguished travellers have spoken of their luminous properties, it is at least probable that they or their congeners act an important part in dramas similar to that which has been just described. At all events, their history clearly shows the vastness of the scale of animal existence in the superficial waters of the ocean. But for the little yellow spot within their bodies, they would be totally invisible at the distance of a few feet in their native fluid, and could not interfere appreciably with the progress of the rays of light.
If further proof were necessary to show the incalculable increase of many oceanic tribes, it might be found in the history of living beings much more familiar to the mariner. Most persons have met with notices of the Portuguese man-of-war, called, by naturalists physalia, a living air sac of jelly provided with a sail, armed with a multitude of dependant bottle shaped stomachs, all capable of seizing prey, and colored more beautifully than the rainbow. This splendid creature pursues its way over the waves with all the skill of an accomplished pilot, and furnishes, when caught, one of the most astonishing examples of the adaptation of animal structure to the peculiar wants, and theatre of action of living beings, one of the most striking evidences of Omniscient Wisdom which nature offers to the moralist. The physalia rarely sails in squadrons, but wanders solitary and self-dependent over the tropical seas, a terror even to man, by the power which it possesses of stinging and inflicting pain upon whatever comes in contact with its long, trailing cables.
But there is another little sailor called the velella; unprovided with offensive weapons, though formed in most respects upon a model somewhat similar to that of the physalia, unguarded as the peaceful trader against the piratical attacks of a thousand enemies, its very race would soon become extinct, were it not for its unlimited increase.
Provided with a flat, transparent, oval scale of cartilage, for the support of a gelatinous body, it floats by specific levity, alone, for it has no air vessel—and employs its hundreds of stomachs for ballast. Another scale arising at right angles with the first and covered with thin membrane, supplies it with a sail. This unprotected creature serves as food for many predatory tribes, and of these, the most voracious is the barnacle. The flesh devoured, the scales still float for many days, mere wrecks of these gay vessels.
The velellæ are usually found in fleets, and to convey some idea of their numbers, I may state that on one occasion, when sailing before the western winds, beyond the southern latitude of the Cape of Good Hope, our ship encountered a group of globular masses of a pale yellow color swimming upon the surface and surrounded by fringes of an unknown substance. Each mass resembled the eggs of some great sea-bird, reposing on a nest of buoyant feathers. Taking them with a dip net, from the chains, we found the yellow masses to be globular cryptogamous plants, to every one of which adhered a group of barnacles, far larger than the largest I had ever seen before.[[1]] Many of these last were so intent upon demolishing their prey, that, even in leaving their native element, to fall into the hands of tyrants more dangerous than themselves, it was not always relinquished. Grasping in their horny arms the unfortunate velellæ, they continued grinding the soft jelly from the tougher cartilage, with an avidity and determination that reminded me strongly of the scene in Byron’s Siege of Corinth, where Alp, the renegade,
“Saw the lean dogs beneath the wall
Hold, o’er the dead, their carnival,
Gorging and growling o’er carcass and limb;
They were too busy to bark at him!”
This drew our attention to the source from which such plentiful supplies of food were obtained, and on examination, the ocean was found literally covered with the scales of the murdered velellæ, faintly distinguishable by their glistening in the sunshine, and interspersed with a few living specimens waiting their turn in the general massacre. We scooped them up by thousands; and for three long days the ship swept onward “dead before the wind” with the steady and scarcely paralleled speed of more than ten knots an hour, thus accomplishing a change of more than seven hundred miles in longitude, before the last remnant of this unhappy fleet was passed.
Though it is not pretended that these little sea-boats possess the phosphorescent quality, their numbers and the wide extent of their flotilla will suffice to render far less wonderful the vastness of those beautiful results of animal secretion which have furnished the subject of this sketch.
But there are other similar and more remarkable phenomena attendant on these brilliant night scenes, that can only be explained, either by supposing that myriads of these aquatic beings are endowed with a community of instinct, or, that the changes of the weather influenced them in such a way as to awaken all their luminous powers upon the instant, without the intervention of any mechanical disturbing cause, in the mere frolic mood of nature.
Those who have visited the Chinese islands, or either of several other well known regions in the Pacific, have been occasionally surprised, on a calm moon-light night, when scarce a swell, and not a ripple is perceptible, to see the ocean suddenly converted into one wide pool of milk! As described by a few observers who have been so fortunate as to witness this rare and strange appearance, the color is so equally diffused over the whole field of view, that all resemblance to the ordinary hue is lost, and yet no wandering stars,—no scattered torches can be seen—not even beneath the bows—so feeble is the intensity of the light emitted, that several have denied the agency of phosphorescence in producing this remarkable effect, and were convinced there was a real change in the nature of the fluid; but others, less enamored of the supernatural, have clearly proved that even this phenomenon is due to the activity of an infinity of animalcules.
The very rarity of such occurrences distinctly shows that the microscopic beings which produce it do not emit their light at all times, and there must exist some cause for this wide-spread and consentaneous action. To community of instinct it can hardly be attributed.
We may understand the fact, wonderful as it may be, that an army of emmets should cross a public road or open space, from field to field, or from forest to forest, fashioning themselves, as they are sometimes known to do, into the form of a snake, by crawling over each other’s backs, by dozens, from the tail to the head of the figure; thus shortening it at one extremity, while they lengthen it at the other, and cause it to advance slowly towards their desired retreat! We may understand this evidence of untaught wisdom, for we see its purpose and its usefulness. Such means enable these defenceless beings to elude the vigilance of their feathery enemies, whose beaks, but for the terror of the mimic reptile, would soon annihilate the weak community.
We may even comprehend that more magnificent display of providential guidance witnessed in the habits of the coral animals, where nations of separate beings, outnumbering a thousand times the living population of the earth and air, enjoy one common life, and build up islands, for the use of man, on models definitely fixed. For here, also, there is purpose, and were it not that every individual of the host performs his proper duty—constructing, here a buttress, there an alcove,—the dash of the billows and the fury of the storm would soon disintegrate the growing structure. The reef that lies athwart the mariner’s path, and strews itself with wrecks, would never rise above the surface, to gather the seeds of vegetation, attract the cool, fresh moisture from the air, and lay foundations for the future happiness and wealth of man.
But how shall we explain an instinct by which myriads of creatures, totally distinct and unconnected, are induced, without apparent end or object, to act in concert over leagues of sea, as it would seem merely to fright the passing voyager! It may be that the action of these animalcules, by which the milky glimmering is occasioned, is involuntary. It may be the result of atmospheric or electric influence upon the living frame, to serve some hidden purpose in their unknown economy; for many things, even in our own organic history, surpass our powers of comprehension; we know neither their nature nor their use. But analogy would lead us to infer the exercise of will in all the various phenomena of phosphorescence, however impenetrable the purpose of its exercise may be. Like the insect songs of a summer night, or the love-light of the glow-worm and the fire-fly, they probably control or guide the motions of the individual or of whole communities.
This idea receives some countenance from the history of a more remarkable example of this sub-marine meteor, witnessed in the southern summer of 1823-4, near the island of Tristan d’Acunha, under circumstances never to be forgotten—and with one short notice of its character I will leave the reader to his reflections upon these wonders of the deep.
The night was dark and damp—the western breeze too light to steady the vessel, and she rolled heavily over the wide swell of the South Atlantic, making it difficult for a landsman to maintain his footing on the deck. A fog-bank, which hung around the northern horizon at sunset, now came sweeping slowly down upon us in the twilight. The captain ordered the light sails furled in expectation of a squall, and we stood leaning together over the bulwarks, watching the mist, which approached more and more rapidly, till it resembled, in the increasing darkness, an immense and toppling wall extending from the water to the clouds, and seemed threatening to crush us beneath it. There was something peculiarly awful in its impenetrable obscurity; and even the crew relinquished their several occupations to gaze on the unusual aspect of the fog. It reached us;—but just at this moment, a flash, like a broad sheet of summer lightning, spread itself over the ocean as far as the eye could reach, but deep below the waves. Five or six times, at intervals, of a few seconds, the flash was repeated, and then the vessel was enveloped in the mist. The breeze immediately quickened; the sailors sprang to their stations, and, for a few minutes, the bustle of preparation for a change of wind attracted the exclusive attention of every one. In this short interval, the narrow belt of vapor had passed off to leeward, and left us bounding merrily along at the rate of ten knots an hour, with a spanking norther full upon our beam, over waves sparkling and dancing in the clear, bright moon-light. But, the lightning of the waters was gone!
| [1] | The Anatifa Vitrea. |
CALLORE.
———
BY ALEXANDER A. IRVINE.
———
Thou art ever fair to me—
Fairer than the Autumn moon,
Or a fountain, in its glee,
Singing through the woods of June—
Fairer than a streamlet bright
Flowing on in shimmered light,
Darkling under grassy sedge
Fringing all the river’s edge,
Rippling by the breezes fann’d,
Sliding over silver sand,
Through the meadow gayly ranging
With an aspect ever changing,
Yet with quiet depths below,
And an even, constant flow,
Pensive, musical and slow—
Ever such thou art to me,
Laughing, blue-eyed Callore!
Oh! the stars have sybil tones!
Singing by their golden thrones,
Singing as they watching stand
In their weird and silent land!
But thy voice is sweeter far
Than the music of the star!
Melting on the air at even,
With a mystic sound
Flowing, flowing all around,
’Till the soul is raised to heaven
Oh! at moments such as these
I could kneel on bended knees,
Ever kneel and hear thee sing,
Silent, rapt and worshipping.
As a bark upon the tide
Moving on to symphony,
With its dipping oars beside
Keeping time melodiously,
So thou movest on thy way,
Ever graceful, ever gay.
Or, perchance, in sportive band,
With thy sisters hand in hand,
Swinging all in mystic round—
Thou wilt dance with gentle sound,
A sound as that of fairy feet,
Soft, harmonious and sweet,
As woodland waterfalls at night
Tinkling in the still starlight.
How thine eyes with tears o’erflow
At the troubled tale of wo—
In those eyes I love to look,
They to me are as a book.
There I read without disguise,
And a joy beyond control,
All that in thine inner soul
As upon an altar lies—
Gazing thus, I feel as when
Buried from the haunts of men,
In some quiet shady nook,
Looking downwards in the brook—
I have heard the forest breeze
Wake mysterious melodies,
Bringing sounds of childish play
From the solitudes away,
Singing as a gleesome boy,
Ravishing the soul with joy,
Lifting it on pinions free—
Silver-tonguéd Callore!
Ever, ever thou art meek,
With a mirthful soberness;
None have ever heard thee speak
Of thy passing loveliness—
Thou dost joy to be away
From the garish light of day;
Brooding o’er each holy feeling
Soft across thy bosom stealing;
With thine eyelids downward bent,
Musing in a meek content,
Like a saint upon a shrine
Wrapt in dreams of bliss divine!
Surely, thou art not of earth—
With the angels is thy birth—
Thou hast come awhile, to be
My guide to heaven, Callore!
THE SISTERS.
A TALE OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.
———
BY H. W. HERBERT, AUTHOR OF “RINGWOOD THE ROVER,” “THE BROTHERS,” “CROMWELL,” ETC. ETC.
———