It is marvellous to
reflect that the whole of our coal-trade was carried on in those queer
tubs only sixty years ago. They are passing away, and the gallant,
ignorant, comical race of sailors who manned them has all but
disappeared; the ugly sordid iron box that goes snorting past us,
belching out jets of water from her dirty side--that is the agency that
destroyed the colliers, and, alas, destroyed the finest breed of seamen
that ever the world saw! So rapidly do new sights and sounds greet us
that the night steals down almost before we are aware of its approach.
The day is for joy; but, ah, the night is for subtle overmastering
rapture, for pregnant gloom, for thoughts that lie too deep for tears!
If a wind springs up when the last ray of the sun shoots over the
shoulder of the earth, then the ship roars through an inky sea, and the
mysterious blending of terror and ecstasy cannot be restrained. Hoarsely
the breeze shrieks in the cordage, savagely the water roars as it darts
away astern like a broad fierce white flame. The vessel seems to spring
forward and shake herself with passion as the sea retards her, and the
whole wild symphony of humming ropes, roaring water, screaming wind,
sets every pulse bounding.
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