Yes, it was indeed a lovely night; but, ah! quickly indeed do scene and weather change at sea.
Book Two—Chapter Three.
On the Wings of a Westerly Gale.
“And now the storm-blast came, and he
Was tyrannous and strong;
He struck with his o’ertaking wings
And chased us north along.
And the ship drove fast, loud roared the blast,
And northward ay we flew.”
Coleridge.
Scene: A ship on her beam ends, not far off the coast of Norway, the seas all around her houses high; their tops cut short off by the force of the wind, and the spray driven over the seemingly doomed ship, like the drift in a moorland snowstorm. The sky is clear, there is a yellow glare in the west where the sun went down. A full moon riding high in a yellow haze.
A gale of wind got out of its cave—for according to the ancients the winds do live in a cave. It was a gale from the west, with something southerly in it, and I feel nearly sure, from the rampancy with which it roared, from the vigour with which it blew, and the capers it cut, that this gale of wind must have taken French leave of its cave.
It seemed to rejoice in its freedom, nevertheless. No schoolboy just escaped from his tasks was ever more full of freaks and mischief.
It came hallooing over the Atlantic Ocean, and every ship it met had to do honour to it on the spot, by furling sails, or even laying to under bare poles.