Two Years in the French West Indies | Page 5

of
cloud-colors,--a dream of high carmine cliffs and rocks outlying in a
green sea, which lashes their bases with a foam of gold....
Even after dark the touch of the wind has the warmth of flesh. There is
no moon; the sea-circle is black as Acheron; and our phosphor wake
reappears quivering across it,--seeming to reach back to the very
horizon. It is brighter to-night,--looks like another Via Lactea,--with
points breaking through it like stars in a nebula. From our prow ripples
rimmed with fire keep fleeing away to right and left into the
night,--brightening as they run, then vanishing suddenly as if they had
passed over a precipice. Crests of swells seem to burst into showers of
sparks, and great patches of spume catch flame, smoulder through, and
disappear.... The Southern Cross is visible,--sloping backward and
sidewise, as if propped against the vault of the sky: it is not readily
discovered by the unfamiliarized eye; it is only after it has been well
pointed out to you that you discern its position. Then you find it is only
the suggestion of a cross--four stars set almost quadrangularly, some
brighter than others.
For two days there has been little conversation on board. It may be due
in part to the somnolent influence of the warm wind,-- in part to the
ceaseless booming of waters and roar of rigging, which drown men's
voices; but I fancy it is much more due to the impressions of space and
depth and vastness,--the impressions of sea and sky, which compel
something akin to awe.

VII.
Morning over the Caribbean Sea,--a calm, extremely dark-blue sea.
There are lands in sight,--high lands, with sharp, peaked, unfamiliar
outlines.
We passed other lands in the darkness: they no doubt resembled the
shapes towering up around us now; for these are evidently volcanic
creations,--jagged, coned, truncated, eccentric. Far off they first looked

a very pale gray; now, as the light increases, they change hue a
little,--showing misty greens and smoky blues. They rise very sharply
from the sea to great heights,--the highest point always with a cloud
upon it;--they thrust out singular long spurs, push up mountain shapes
that have an odd scooped-out look. Some, extremely far away, seem, as
they catch the sun, to be made of gold vapor; others have a madderish
tone: these are colors of cloud. The closer we approach them, the more
do tints of green make themselves visible. Purplish or bluish masses of
coast slowly develop green surfaces; folds and wrinkles of land turn
brightly verdant. Still, the color gleams as through a thin fog.
... The first tropical visitor has just boarded our ship: a wonderful fly,
shaped like a common fly, but at least five times larger. His body is a
beautiful shining black; his wings seem ribbed and jointed with silver,
his head is jewel-green, with exquisitely cut emeralds for eyes.
Islands pass and disappear behind us. The sun has now risen well; the
sky is a rich blue, and the tardy moon still hangs in it. Lilac tones show
through the water. In the south there are a few straggling small white
clouds,--like a long flight of birds. A great gray mountain shape looms
up before us. We are steaming on Santa Cruz.
The island has a true volcanic outline, sharp and high: the cliffs sheer
down almost perpendicularly. The shape is still vapory, varying in
coloring from purplish to bright gray; but wherever peaks and spurs
fully catch the sun they edge themselves with a beautiful green glow,
while interlying ravines seem filled with foggy blue.
As we approach, sun lighted surfaces come out still more luminously
green. Glens and sheltered valleys still hold blues and grays; but points
fairly illuminated by the solar glow show just such a fiery green as
burns in the plumage of certain humming-birds. And just as the lustrous
colors of these birds shift according to changes of light, so the island
shifts colors here and there,--from emerald to blue, and blue to gray....
But now we are near: it shows us a lovely heaping of high bright hills
in front,--with a further coast-line very low and long and verdant,
fringed with a white beach, and tufted with spidery palm-crests.
Immediately opposite, other palms are poised; their trunks look like

pillars of unpolished silver, their leaves shimmer like bronze.
... The water of the harbor is transparent and pale green. One can see
many fish, and some small sharks. White butterflies are fluttering about
us in the blue air. Naked black boys are bathing on the beach;--they
swim well, but will not venture out far because of the sharks. A boat
puts off to bring colored girls on board. They are tall, and not uncomely,
although very dark;-- they coax us, with all sorts