How different is this disagreeable motion from that which we enjoy when the wind is on the beam or the quarter!—Then, we glide gently over the sea-hills, and every wave seems playfully bent on urging us forward:—Now, we are opposed unceasingly by wind and swell, and must contest laboriously each foot of the battle-ground, till the strength of our enemies is exhausted—conscious the while, that every league we loose in this strange, fitful region, may cost us a week’s delay in the recovery.
This is “a young gale” that bids fair to prove precocious; for it is rapidly advancing towards maturity. But it cannot last. Nothing but a calm displays much tendency to permanence between the trades.
The heavens are dark as midnight:—no star or planet penetrates the gloom with a friendly ray:—yet the color of the overhanging vault is by no means uniform. Broad tracts or patches of intense obscurity cover the chief part of the field of view; but, at intervals, you may perceive long, moving, dusky lines dividing these heavy masses, made visible by a strange and unaccountable half illumination. As they sweep hurriedly by, on their northward course, seemingly almost within reach from the mast head, we are made painfully conscious that the wings of the tempest are hovering over us in dangerous proximity.
Except the lamps in the binnacle, there is no obvious source of light above or around us: yet the outlines of the vessel, with all the labyrinth of spars and rigging, are dimly traceable in the murky air. Whence do we derive this power of vision? you will naturally inquire.—A glance at the surface of the water will explain it.
Every wave, as it combs and breaks, bears on its summit a high crest of foam, visible at a great distance by its own moonlight, or soft silvery radiation. Each little ripple carries its tiny lantern. Wherever the sea is disturbed by the motion of the vessel, and especially at the bow, where the waters are rudely disparted, or in the wake, where they rush together violently as she shoots along, a gentle, milky light is broadly diffused; and here and there a brilliant spark is seen beneath the surface shining distinct and permanent, like a star submerged, or gleaming and disappearing alternately, like the fire-flies of June.
The phosphorescence of the sea is unusually feeble at present, but it is sufficient to prevent a total darkness, and by its aid we trace the dim forms of surrounding objects, while a slight reflection from the clouds betrays the threatening aspect of the weather.
Do you observe those singular luminous appearances resembling masses of pale fire, or torch lights, hurrying from place to place, turning and meandering in all directions, some feet beneath the waves, like comets liberated from their proper spheres, and wandering without rule in the abyss of waters? They are produced by fish that are playing about the vessel, and were we adepts in the sport we might chance to strike one with the grains by the glare of his own torch. But this requires the skill and long experience of many voyages. To strike a fish by day is difficult enough; for, even then, he is not to be found where he appears. When you look obliquely from the vessel’s side at any object in the water, refraction changes its apparent place to a much greater distance than the real one, and brings the image nearer to the surface. Success in reaching such an object requires your aim to be directed towards a point considerably below the spot at which your game is seen. At night the difficulty is much enhanced;—for it is not the fish itself that emits the light. The agitation produced by his rapid motions awakens the thousands of luminous animalcules swarming in every cubic foot of water, and, as they fire their little tapers in succession, they fall into the rear, while the fish darts onward under cover of the obscurity, leaving a brilliant wake which serves but to deceive, or sometimes to guide, his enemies, and to attract his prey.
But hark!—How the wind howls through the shrouds and whistles around the slender rigging!—The gale increases, and another change comes over the night scene. Do you observe how pitchy the gloom has grown to windward?—All traces of the clouds in that direction are lost.—Ha!—A flash of lightning!—Here it comes in earnest!—The pouring rain obscures even the phosphoric glimmering of the waves, and now we have “night and storm and darkness,” in all their terrible beauty! Who dares attempt to paint the scene in words!—On every hand,—above—around—within—all is confusion! The crew spring to their stations, while the loud command and the scarce audible response are mingled with the dash of waves, the roar of the blast, and the creaking of the wracked timbers in one discordant, unintelligible burst of sound.
You stand, or rather hang by the mizzen shrouds, the centre of an invisible world where the maddened elements and hardy men contend for life or conquest. You hear them, but you see them not,—save when the electric flash tinges sea and cloud with momentary brilliance. Your eye detects the foot of the nearest mast, but you endeavor in vain to trace the tall spar upwards towards the lofty perch of those brave fellows on the yard, whose shrill voices—heard as if from a mile in the distance, in answer to the trumpet of the captain,—just reach the ear amid the din of a thousand unearthly voices, and add to the wizard wildness of the scene.
The storm swells loud and more loudly; but the yielding ship has risen from the first awful impression of its force and now careers furiously before it. The brailed but unfurled topsails flap with a dull and hollow thunder, as they whirl and rebound under the restraint of the clue-lines and the iron hands of the desperate crew. See that ghastly ball of purple flame leaping from spar to spar, like the visible spirit of the tempest![[3]]—Now it is on the foremast head,—now it glares on the bowsprit,—and again, it springs to the mainyard and flashes full in the face of you startled reefer, casting the hue of death over his boyish features, rendered clearly visible for a moment in the demon torchlight.