پنجشنبه ۲۹ شهریور ۰۳ | ۱۵:۲۰ ۱۴ بازديد
y it will all last.
3 August.--Another week gone by, and no news from Jonathan, not even to
Mr. Hawkins, from whom I have heard. Oh, I do hope he is not ill. He surely
would have written. I look at that last letter of his, but somehow it does not
satisfy me. It does not read like him, and yet it is his writing. There is no
mistake of that.
Lucy has not walked much in her sleep the last week, but there is an odd
concentration about her which I do not understand, even in her sleep she seems
to be watching me. She tries the door, and finding it locked, goes about the
room searching for the key.
6 August.--Another three days, and no news. This suspense is getting
dreadful. If I only knew where to write to or where to go to, I should feel easier.
But no one has heard a word of Jonathan since that last letter. I must only pray
to God for patience.
Lucy is more excitable than ever, but is otherwise well. Last night was
very threatening, and the fishermen say that we are in for a storm. I must try to
watch it and learn the weather signs.
Today is a gray day, and the sun as I write is hidden in thick clouds, high
over Kettleness. Everything is gray except the green grass, which seems like
emerald amongst it, gray earthy rock, gray clouds, tinged with the sunburst at
the far edge, hang over the gray sea, into which the sandpoints stretch like gray
figures. The sea is tumbling in over the shallows and the sandy flats with a roar,
muffled in the sea-mists drifting inland. The horizon is lost in a gray mist. All
vastness, the clouds are piled up like giant rocks, and there is a 'brool' over the
sea that sounds like some passage of doom. Dark figures are on the beach here
and there, sometimes half shrouded in the mist, and seem 'men like trees
walking'. The fishing boats are racing for home, and rise and dip in the ground
swell as they sweep into the harbour, bending to the scuppers. Here comes old
Mr. Swales. He is making straight for me, and I can see, by the way he lifts his
hat, that he wants to talk.
I have been quite touched by the change in the poor old man. When he sat
down beside me, he said in a very gentle way, "I want to say something to you,
miss."
I could see he was not at ease, so I took his poor old wrinkled hand in mine
and asked him to speak fully.
So he said, leaving his hand in mine, "I'm afraid, my deary, that I must
have shocked you by all the wicked things I've been sayin' about the dead, and
such like, for weeks past, but I didn't mean them, and I want ye to remember
that when I'm gone. We aud folks that be daffled, and with one foot abaft the
krok-hooal, don't altogether like to think of it, and we don't want to feel scart of
it, and that's why I've took to makin' light of it, so that I'd cheer up my own
heart a bit. But, Lord love ye, miss, I ain't afraid of dyin', not a bit, only I don't
want to die if I can help it. My time must be nigh at hand now, for I be aud, and
a hundred years is too much for any man to expect. And I'm so nigh it that the
Aud Man is already whettin' his scythe. Ye see, I can't get out o' the habit of
caffin' about it all at once. The chafts will wag as they be used to. Some day
soon the Angel of Death will sound his trumpet for me. But don't ye dooal an'
greet, my deary!"--for he saw that I was crying--"if he should come this very
night I'd not refuse to answer his call. For life be, after all, only a waitin' for
somethin' else than what we're doin', and death be all that we can rightly
depend on. But I'm content, for it's comin' to me, my deary, and comin' quick.
It may be comin' while we be lookin' and wonderin'. Maybe it's in that wind out
over the sea that's bringin' with it loss and wreck, and sore distress, and sad
hearts. Look! Look!" he cried suddenly. "There's something in that wind and in
the hoast beyont that sounds, and looks, and tastes, and smells like death. It's in
the air. I feel it comin'. Lord, make me answer cheerful, when my call comes!"
He held up his arms devoutly, and raised his hat. His mouth moved as though
he were praying. After a few minutes' silence, he got up, shook hands with me,
and blessed me, and said goodbye, and hobbled off. It all touched me, and
upset me very much.
I was glad when the coastguard came along, with his spyglass under his
arm. He stopped to talk with me, as he always does, but all the time kept
looking at a strange ship.
"I can't make her out," he said. "She's a Russian, by the look of her. But
she's knocking about in the queerest way. She doesn't know her mind a bit. She
seems to see the storm coming, but can't decide whether to run up north in the
open, or to put in here. Look there again! She is steered mighty strangely, for
she doesn't mind the hand on the wheel, changes about with every puff of wind.
We'll hear more of her before this time tomorrow."
CHAPTER 7
CUTTING FROM "THE DAILYGRAPH", 8 AUGUST
(PASTED IN MINA MURRAY'S JOURNAL)
From a correspondent.
Whitby.
One of the greatest and suddenest storms on record has just been
experienced here, with results both strange and unique. The weather had been
somewhat sultry, but not to any degree uncommon in the month of August.
Saturday evening was as fine as was ever known, and the great body of
holiday-makers laid out yesterday for visits to Mulgrave Woods, Robin Hood's
Bay, Rig Mill, Runswick, Staithes, and the various trips in the neighborhood of
Whitby. The steamers Emma and Scarborough made trips up and down the
coast, and there was an unusual amount of 'tripping' both to and from Whitby.
The day was unusually fine till the afternoon, when some of the gossips who
frequent the East Cliff churchyard, and from the commanding eminence watch
the wide sweep of sea visible to the north and east, called attention to a sudden
show of 'mares tails' high in the sky to the northwest. The wind was then
blowing from the south-west in the mild degree which in barometrical language
is ranked 'No. 2, light breeze.'
The coastguard on duty at once made report, and one old fisherman, who
for more than half a century has kept watch on weather signs from the East
Cliff, foretold in an emphatic manner the coming of a sudden storm. The
approach of sunset was so very beautiful, so grand in its masses of splendidly
coloured clouds, that there was quite an assemblage on the walk along the cliff
in the old churchyard to enjoy the beauty. Before the sun dipped below the
black mass of Kettleness, standing boldly athwart the western sky, its
downward way was marked by myriad clouds of every sunset colour, flame,
purple, pink, green, violet, and all the tints of gold, with here and there masses
not large, but of seemingly absolute blackness, in all sorts of shapes, as well
outlined as colossal silhouettes. The experience was not lost on the painters,
and doubtless some of the sketches of the 'Prelude to the Great Storm' will
grace the R. A and R. I. walls in May next.
More than one captain made up his mind then and there that his 'cobble' or
his 'mule', as they term the different classes of boats, would remain in the
harbour till the storm had passed. The wind fell away entirely during the
evening, and at midnight there was a dead calm, a sultry heat, and that
prevailing intensity which, on the approach of thunder, affects persons of a
sensitive nature.
There were but few lights in sight at sea, for even the coasting steamers,
which usually hug the shore so closely, kept well to seaward, and but few
fishing boats were in sight. The only sail noticeable was a foreign schooner
with all sails set, which was seemingly going westwards. The foolhardiness or
ignorance of her officers was a prolific theme for comment whilst she remained
in sight, and efforts were made to signal her to reduce sail in the face of her
danger. Before the night shut down she was seen with sails idly flapping as she
gently rolled on the undulating swell of the sea.
"As idle as a painted ship upon a painted ocean."
Shortly before ten o'clock the stillness of the air grew quite oppressive, and
the silence was so marked that the bleating of a sheep inland or the barking of a
dog in the town was distinctly heard, and the band on the pier, with its lively
French air, was like a dischord in the great harmony of nature's silence. A little
after midnight came a strange sound from over the sea, and high overhead the
air began to carry a strange, faint, hollow booming.
Then without warning the tempest broke. With a rapidity which, at the
time, seemed incredible, and even afterwards is impossible to realize, the whole
aspect of nature at once became convulsed. The waves rose in growing fury,
each over-topping its fellow, till in a very few minutes the lately glassy sea was
like a roaring and devouring monster. White-crested waves beat madly on the
level sands and rushed up the shelving cliffs. Others broke over the piers, and
with their spume swept the lanthorns of the lighthouses which rise from the end
of either pier of Whitby Harbour.
The wind roared like thunder, and blew with such force that it was with
difficulty that even strong men kept their feet, or clung with grim clasp to the
iron stanchions. It was found necessary to clear the entire pier from the mass of
onlookers, or else the fatalities of the night would have increased manifold. To
add to the difficulties and dangers of the time, masses of sea-fog came drifting
inland. White, wet clouds, which swept by in ghostly fashion, so dank and
damp and cold that it needed but little effort of imagination to think that the
spirits of those lost at sea were touching their living brethren with the clammy
hands of death, and many a one shuddered as the wreaths of sea-mist swept by.
At times the mist cleared, and the sea for some distance could be seen in
the glare of the lightning, which came thick and fast, followed by such peals of
thunder that the whole sky overhead seemed trembling under the shock of the
footsteps of the storm.
Some of the scenes thus revealed were of immeasurable grandeur and of
absorbing interest. The sea, running mountains high, threw skywards with each
wave mighty masses of white foam, which the tempest seemed to snatch at and
whirl away into space. Here and there a fishing boat, with a rag of sail, running
madly for shelter before the blast, now and again the white wings of a storm-
tossed seabird. On the summit of the East Cliff the new searchlight was ready
for experiment, but had not yet been tried. The officers in charge of it got it into
working order, and in the pauses of onrushing mist swept with it the surface of
the sea. Once or twice its service was most effective, as when a fishing boat,
with gunwale under water, rushed into the harbour, able, by the guidance of the
sheltering light, to avoid the danger of dashing against the piers. As each boat
achieved the safety of the port there was a shout of joy from the mass of people
on the shore, a shout which for a moment seemed to cleave the gale and was
then swept away in its rush.
Before long the searchlight discovered some distance away a schooner
with all sails set, apparently the same vessel which had been noticed earlier in
the evening. The wind had by this time backed to the east, and there was a
shudder amongst the watchers on the cliff as they realized the terrible danger in
which she now was.
Between her and the port lay the great flat reef on which so many good
ships have from time to time suffered, and, with the wind blowing from its
present quarter, it would be quite impossible that she should fetch the entrance
of the harbour.
It was now nearly the hour of high tide, but the waves were so great that in
their troughs the shallows of the shore were almost visible, and the schooner,
with all sails set, was rushing with such speed that, in the words of one old salt,
"she must fetch up somewhere, if it was only in hell". Then came another rush
of sea-fog, greater than any hitherto, a mass of dank mist, which seemed to
close on all things like a gray pall, and left available to men only the organ of
hearing, for the roar of the tempest, and the crash of the thunder, and the
booming of the mighty billows came through the damp oblivion even louder
than before. The rays of the searchlight were kept fixed on the harbour mouth
across the East Pier, where the shock was expected, and men waited breathless.
The wind suddenly shifted to the northeas
3 August.--Another week gone by, and no news from Jonathan, not even to
Mr. Hawkins, from whom I have heard. Oh, I do hope he is not ill. He surely
would have written. I look at that last letter of his, but somehow it does not
satisfy me. It does not read like him, and yet it is his writing. There is no
mistake of that.
Lucy has not walked much in her sleep the last week, but there is an odd
concentration about her which I do not understand, even in her sleep she seems
to be watching me. She tries the door, and finding it locked, goes about the
room searching for the key.
6 August.--Another three days, and no news. This suspense is getting
dreadful. If I only knew where to write to or where to go to, I should feel easier.
to God for patience.
Lucy is more excitable than ever, but is otherwise well. Last night was
very threatening, and the fishermen say that we are in for a storm. I must try to
watch it and learn the weather signs.
Today is a gray day, and the sun as I write is hidden in thick clouds, high
over Kettleness. Everything is gray except the green grass, which seems like
emerald amongst it, gray earthy rock, gray clouds, tinged with the sunburst at
the far edge, hang over the gray sea, into which the sandpoints stretch like gray
figures. The sea is tumbling in over the shallows and the sandy flats with a roar,
muffled in the sea-mists drifting inland. The horizon is lost in a gray mist. All
vastness, the clouds are piled up like giant rocks, and there is a 'brool' over the
sea that sounds like some passage of doom. Dark figures are on the beach here
and there, sometimes half shrouded in the mist, and seem 'men like trees
walking'. The fishing boats are racing for home, and rise and dip in the ground
swell as they sweep into the harbour, bending to the scuppers. Here comes old
Mr. Swales. He is making straight for me, and I can see, by the way he lifts his
hat, that he wants to talk.
I have been quite touched by the change in the poor old man. When he sat
down beside me, he said in a very gentle way, "I want to say something to you,
miss."
I could see he was not at ease, so I took his poor old wrinkled hand in mine
and asked him to speak fully.
So he said, leaving his hand in mine, "I'm afraid, my deary, that I must
have shocked you by all the wicked things I've been sayin' about the dead, and
such like, for weeks past, but I didn't mean them, and I want ye to remember
that when I'm gone. We aud folks that be daffled, and with one foot abaft the
krok-hooal, don't altogether like to think of it, and we don't want to feel scart of
it, and that's why I've took to makin' light of it, so that I'd cheer up my own
heart a bit. But, Lord love ye, miss, I ain't afraid of dyin', not a bit, only I don't
want to die if I can help it. My time must be nigh at hand now, for I be aud, and
a hundred years is too much for any man to expect. And I'm so nigh it that the
Aud Man is already whettin' his scythe. Ye see, I can't get out o' the habit of
caffin' about it all at once. The chafts will wag as they be used to. Some day
soon the Angel of Death will sound his trumpet for me. But don't ye dooal an'
greet, my deary!"--for he saw that I was crying--"if he should come this very
night I'd not refuse to answer his call. For life be, after all, only a waitin' for
depend on. But I'm content, for it's comin' to me, my deary, and comin' quick.
It may be comin' while we be lookin' and wonderin'. Maybe it's in that wind out
over the sea that's bringin' with it loss and wreck, and sore distress, and sad
hearts. Look! Look!" he cried suddenly. "There's something in that wind and in
the hoast beyont that sounds, and looks, and tastes, and smells like death. It's in
the air. I feel it comin'. Lord, make me answer cheerful, when my call comes!"
He held up his arms devoutly, and raised his hat. His mouth moved as though
he were praying. After a few minutes' silence, he got up, shook hands with me,
and blessed me, and said goodbye, and hobbled off. It all touched me, and
upset me very much.
I was glad when the coastguard came along, with his spyglass under his
arm. He stopped to talk with me, as he always does, but all the time kept
looking at a strange ship.
"I can't make her out," he said. "She's a Russian, by the look of her. But
she's knocking about in the queerest way. She doesn't know her mind a bit. She
seems to see the storm coming, but can't decide whether to run up north in the
open, or to put in here. Look there again! She is steered mighty strangely, for
she doesn't mind the hand on the wheel, changes about with every puff of wind.
We'll hear more of her before this time tomorrow."
CHAPTER 7
CUTTING FROM "THE DAILYGRAPH", 8 AUGUST
(PASTED IN MINA MURRAY'S JOURNAL)
From a correspondent.
Whitby.
One of the greatest and suddenest storms on record has just been
experienced here, with results both strange and unique. The weather had been
somewhat sultry, but not to any degree uncommon in the month of August.
Saturday evening was as fine as was ever known, and the great body of
Bay, Rig Mill, Runswick, Staithes, and the various trips in the neighborhood of
Whitby. The steamers Emma and Scarborough made trips up and down the
coast, and there was an unusual amount of 'tripping' both to and from Whitby.
The day was unusually fine till the afternoon, when some of the gossips who
frequent the East Cliff churchyard, and from the commanding eminence watch
the wide sweep of sea visible to the north and east, called attention to a sudden
show of 'mares tails' high in the sky to the northwest. The wind was then
blowing from the south-west in the mild degree which in barometrical language
is ranked 'No. 2, light breeze.'
The coastguard on duty at once made report, and one old fisherman, who
for more than half a century has kept watch on weather signs from the East
Cliff, foretold in an emphatic manner the coming of a sudden storm. The
approach of sunset was so very beautiful, so grand in its masses of splendidly
coloured clouds, that there was quite an assemblage on the walk along the cliff
in the old churchyard to enjoy the beauty. Before the sun dipped below the
black mass of Kettleness, standing boldly athwart the western sky, its
downward way was marked by myriad clouds of every sunset colour, flame,
purple, pink, green, violet, and all the tints of gold, with here and there masses
not large, but of seemingly absolute blackness, in all sorts of shapes, as well
outlined as colossal silhouettes. The experience was not lost on the painters,
and doubtless some of the sketches of the 'Prelude to the Great Storm' will
grace the R. A and R. I. walls in May next.
More than one captain made up his mind then and there that his 'cobble' or
his 'mule', as they term the different classes of boats, would remain in the
harbour till the storm had passed. The wind fell away entirely during the
evening, and at midnight there was a dead calm, a sultry heat, and that
prevailing intensity which, on the approach of thunder, affects persons of a
sensitive nature.
There were but few lights in sight at sea, for even the coasting steamers,
which usually hug the shore so closely, kept well to seaward, and but few
fishing boats were in sight. The only sail noticeable was a foreign schooner
with all sails set, which was seemingly going westwards. The foolhardiness or
ignorance of her officers was a prolific theme for comment whilst she remained
in sight, and efforts were made to signal her to reduce sail in the face of her
danger. Before the night shut down she was seen with sails idly flapping as she
gently rolled on the undulating swell of the sea.
"As idle as a painted ship upon a painted ocean."
the silence was so marked that the bleating of a sheep inland or the barking of a
dog in the town was distinctly heard, and the band on the pier, with its lively
French air, was like a dischord in the great harmony of nature's silence. A little
after midnight came a strange sound from over the sea, and high overhead the
air began to carry a strange, faint, hollow booming.
Then without warning the tempest broke. With a rapidity which, at the
time, seemed incredible, and even afterwards is impossible to realize, the whole
aspect of nature at once became convulsed. The waves rose in growing fury,
each over-topping its fellow, till in a very few minutes the lately glassy sea was
like a roaring and devouring monster. White-crested waves beat madly on the
level sands and rushed up the shelving cliffs. Others broke over the piers, and
with their spume swept the lanthorns of the lighthouses which rise from the end
of either pier of Whitby Harbour.
The wind roared like thunder, and blew with such force that it was with
difficulty that even strong men kept their feet, or clung with grim clasp to the
iron stanchions. It was found necessary to clear the entire pier from the mass of
onlookers, or else the fatalities of the night would have increased manifold. To
add to the difficulties and dangers of the time, masses of sea-fog came drifting
inland. White, wet clouds, which swept by in ghostly fashion, so dank and
damp and cold that it needed but little effort of imagination to think that the
spirits of those lost at sea were touching their living brethren with the clammy
hands of death, and many a one shuddered as the wreaths of sea-mist swept by.
At times the mist cleared, and the sea for some distance could be seen in
the glare of the lightning, which came thick and fast, followed by such peals of
thunder that the whole sky overhead seemed trembling under the shock of the
footsteps of the storm.
Some of the scenes thus revealed were of immeasurable grandeur and of
absorbing interest. The sea, running mountains high, threw skywards with each
wave mighty masses of white foam, which the tempest seemed to snatch at and
whirl away into space. Here and there a fishing boat, with a rag of sail, running
madly for shelter before the blast, now and again the white wings of a storm-
tossed seabird. On the summit of the East Cliff the new searchlight was ready
for experiment, but had not yet been tried. The officers in charge of it got it into
working order, and in the pauses of onrushing mist swept with it the surface of
the sea. Once or twice its service was most effective, as when a fishing boat,
with gunwale under water, rushed into the harbour, able, by the guidance of the
sheltering light, to avoid the danger of dashing against the piers. As each boat
on the shore, a shout which for a moment seemed to cleave the gale and was
then swept away in its rush.
Before long the searchlight discovered some distance away a schooner
with all sails set, apparently the same vessel which had been noticed earlier in
the evening. The wind had by this time backed to the east, and there was a
shudder amongst the watchers on the cliff as they realized the terrible danger in
which she now was.
Between her and the port lay the great flat reef on which so many good
ships have from time to time suffered, and, with the wind blowing from its
present quarter, it would be quite impossible that she should fetch the entrance
of the harbour.
It was now nearly the hour of high tide, but the waves were so great that in
their troughs the shallows of the shore were almost visible, and the schooner,
with all sails set, was rushing with such speed that, in the words of one old salt,
"she must fetch up somewhere, if it was only in hell". Then came another rush
of sea-fog, greater than any hitherto, a mass of dank mist, which seemed to
close on all things like a gray pall, and left available to men only the organ of
hearing, for the roar of the tempest, and the crash of the thunder, and the
booming of the mighty billows came through the damp oblivion even louder
than before. The rays of the searchlight were kept fixed on the harbour mouth
across the East Pier, where the shock was expected, and men waited breathless.
The wind suddenly shifted to the northeas
dfs3434