In the Footprints of the Padres | Page 5

the green outlining
itself in emerald, with many a shade of lighter or darker green fretting
its surface, throwing cliff and crest into high relief, and hinting at misty
and mysterious vales, as fair as fathomless. It floated up like a cloud
from the nether world, and was at first without form and void, even as
its fellows were; but as we drew nearer--for we were steaming toward it
across a sea of sapphire,--it brooded upon the face of the water, while
the clouds that had hung about it were scattered and wafted away.
Thus was an island born to us of sea and sky,--an island whose peak
was sky-kissed, whose vales were overshadowed by festoons of vapor,
whose heights were tipped with sunshine, and along whose shore the
sea sang softly, and the creaming breakers wreathed themselves,

flashed like snow-drifts, vanished and flashed again. The sea danced
and sparkled; the air quivered with vibrant light. Along the border of
that island the palm-trees towered and reeled, and all its gardens
breathed perfume such as I had never known or dreamed of.
For a few hours only we basked in its beauty, rejoiced in it, gloried in it;
and then we passed it by. Even as it had risen from the sea it returned
into its bosom and was seen no more. Twilight stole in between us, and
the night blotted it out forever. Forever?
I wonder what island it was? A pearl of the Antilles, surely; but its
name and fame, its history and mystery are lost to me. Its memory lives
and is as green as ever. No wintry blasts visit it; even the rich dyes of
autumn do not discolor it. It is perennial in its rare beauty, unfading,
unforgotten, unforgettable; a thing immutable, immemorial--I had
almost said immortal.
Whence it came and whither it has gone I know not. It had its rising
and its setting; its day from dawn to dusk was perfect. Doubtless there
are those whose lives have been passed within its tranquil shade: from
generation to generation it has known all that they have known of joy
or sorrow. All the world that they have knowledge of has been
compassed by the far blue rim of the horizon. That sky-piercing peak
was ever the centre of their universe, and the wandering sea-bird has
outflown their thoughts.
All this came to me as a child, when the first island "swam into my
ken." It was a great discovery--a revelation. Of it were born all the
islands that have been so much to me in later life. And even then I
seemed to comprehend the singular life that all islanders are forced to
live: the independence of that life--for a man's island is his fortress,
girded about with the fathomless moat of the sea; and the dependence
of it--for what is that island but an atom dotting watery space and so
easily cut off from communication with the world at large? Drought
may visit the islander, and he may be starved; the tornado may desolate
his shore; fever and famine and thirst may lie in wait for him; sickness
and sorrow and death abide with him. Thus is he dependent in his
independence.

And he is insecluded in his seclusion, for he can not escape from the
intruder. He should have no wish that may not be satisfied, provided he
be native born; what can he wish for that is beyond the knowledge he
has gained from the objects within his reach? The world is his, so far as
he knows it; yet if he have one wish that calls for aught beyond his
limited horizon he rests unsatisfied.
All that was lovely in that tropic isle appealed to me and filled me with
a great longing. I wanted to sing with the Beloved Bard:
Oh, had we some bright little isle of our own, In the blue summer ocean,
far off and alone!
And yet even then I felt its unutterable loneliness, as I have felt it a
thousand times since; the loneliness that starves the heart, tortures the
brain, and leaves the mind diseased; the loneliness that is exemplified
in the solitude of Alexander Selkirk.
Robinson Crusoe lived in very truth for me the moment I saw and
comprehended that summer isle. He also is immortal. From that hour
we scoured the sea for islands: from dawn to dark we were on the
watch. The Caribbean Sea is well stocked with them. We were
threading our way among them, and might any day hear the glad cry of
"Land ho!" But we heard it not until the morning of the eleventh day
out from New York. The sea seemed more lonesome than ever when
we lost our, island; the monotony of our life was