Then they returned, all delight and excitement. They had found such a lovely little cove, full of tiny pools, a perfect treasure-house of sea-weeds and sea-anemones; and the rocks, so picturesque, and "so grand to scramble over." (I must confess that to these, my practically-minded "chickens," the picturesque or the romantic always ranked second to the fun of a scramble.) The descent to this marine paradise also seemed difficult enough to charm anybody.
"But you wouldn't do it. Quite impossible! You would break all your legs and arms, and sprain both your ankles."
Alas, for a hen—and an old hen—with ducklings! But mine, though daring, were not rash, and had none of that silly fool-hardiness which for the childish vanity of doing, or of saying one has done, a dangerous thing, risks health, comfort, life, and delights selfishly in making other people utterly miserable. So, being feeble on my feet, though steady in my head, I agreed to sit like a cormorant on the nearest cliff, and look down placidly upon the young adventurers in their next delightful scramble.
It could not be to-night, however, for the tide was coming in fast; the fairy cove would soon be all under water.
"Shall we get a boat? It will soon be sunset and moon-rise; we can watch both from the sea."
That sea! Its broad circle had no other bound than the shores of America, and its blueness, or the strange, changing tint often called blue, almost equalled the blue of the Mediterranean.
"Yes, ma'am, it's a fine evening for a row," said the faithful Charles. "And it isn't often you can get a row here; the sea is so rough, and the landing so difficult. But there's a man I know; he has a good boat, he knows the coast well, and he'll not go out unless it's really safe."
This seemed ultra-prudent, with such a smiling sky and sea; but we soon found it was not unnecessary at the Lizard. Indeed all along the Cornish coast the great Atlantic waves come in with such a roll or a heavy ground-swell, windless, but the precursor of a storm that is slowly arriving from across the ocean, that boating here at best is no child's play.
We had been fair-weather sailors, over shut-in lochs or smooth rivers; all of us could handle an oar, or had handled it in old days, but this was a different style of thing. Descending the steep zigzag path to the next cove—the only one where there was anything like a fair landing—we found we still had to walk through a long bed of sea-weed, and manage somehow to get into the boat between the recoil and advance of a wave. Not one of the tiny waves of quiet bays, but an Atlantic roller, which, even if comparatively small and tame, comes in with a force that will take you off your feet at any time.
However, we managed it, and found ourselves floating among an archipelago of rocks, where the solemn cormorants sat in rows, and affectionate families of gulls kept swimming about in a large flotilla of white dots on the dark water. Very dark the sea was: heaving and sinking in great hills and valleys, which made rowing difficult. Also, for several yards round every rock extended a perfect whirlpool of foaming waves, which, if any boat chanced to be caught therein, would have dashed it to pieces in no time. But our boatmen seemed used to the danger, and took us as near it as possible, without actually running into it.