The night was dark, across the sky dense layers of ragged cloud were flitting, and the water was still, dark, and as thick as oil. It exhaled a moist, saline aroma, and murmured caressingly as it splashed against the sides of the ships and against the shore, and rocked the skiff of Chelkash to and fro. Stretching a long distance seawards from the shore, rose the dark hulls of many vessels, piercing the sky with their sharp masts which had variegated lanterns in their tops. The sea reflected the lights of these lanterns, and was covered with a mass of yellow patches. They twinkled prettily on its soft, faint-black, velvet bosom, heaving so calmly, so powerfully. The sea was sleeping the sleep of a strong and healthy labourer wearied to death by the day's work.
"Let's be off," said Gabriel, thrusting the oar into the water.
"Go!" Chelkash, with a powerful thrust of his hand, thrust the skiff right into the strip of water behind the barques. The skiff flew swiftly through the smooth water, and the water, beneath the stroke of the oars, burned with a bluish, phosphorescent radiance. A long ribbon of this radiance, faintly gleaming, tapered away from the keel of the skiff.
"Well, how's the head? Aching, eh?" inquired Chelkash jocosely.
"Frightfully. It hums like molten iron. I'll wash it with water presently."
"Why? What you want is something to go inside. Take a pull at that—that will soon put you all right," and he handed Gabriel a flask.
"Oh-ho! Lord bless you!"
A gentle gurgle was audible.
"How now? Feel glad, eh? Stop, that'll do!"
The skiff sped on again, lightly and noiselessly, turning and winding among the vessels. Suddenly it wrenched itself free from them, and the sea—the endless, mighty, glistening; sea—lay extended before them, receding into the blue distance, whence there arose out of its waters mountains of cloud of a dark lilac-blue, with yellowish downy fringes at the corners, and greenish clouds the colour of sea water, and those melancholy leaden clouds which cast abroad such heavy, oppressive shadows, crushing down mind and spirit. They crept so slowly away from one another, and now blending with, now pursuing one another, intermingled their shapes and colours, swallowing each other up and re-emerging in fresh shapes, magnificent and menacing.... And there was something mysterious in the gradual motion of these lifeless masses. There seemed to be an infinite host of them at the verge of the sea-shore, and it seemed as if they must always creep indifferently over the face of Heaven, with the sullen, evil aim of obliterating it, and never allowing it to shine down again upon the sleeping sea with its millions of golden eyes, the many-coloured living stars that sparkle so dreamily, awakening lofty desires in those to whom their pure and holy radiance is so precious.