Charles Dixon

“ The atmosphere is balmier than in the torrid zone of Earth, by reason of the greater remoteness of the sun; and the absence of all those insect-pests that make life there unendurable, especially during hours of darkness. Such nights inspire Love! Such an atmosphere makes the tender, sacred passion glow with an intensity unknown in higher and cooler latitudes. The air breathes it; the night-birds sing it; the fountains, in their rising and falling cadence, echo it from grove to grove; the moons and stars, scintillating in their ether sea of blue, excite it ”

“ Few sights in the bird-world are prettier than a colony of disturbed Gulls during the breeding season. As their haunts are invaded, the frightened birds rise in fluttering thousands, drifting to and fro like a snowstorm, in which each flake is a startled bird. The noisy din, the rush of wings, the swooping, soaring, fluttering Gulls, the ground strewn with nests—all combine to form a picture in the mind that time can never efface! The eggs of this Gull are usually three in number, sometimes as many as four. They vary to an almost incredible degree. ”

“ Every marshy spot is almost certain to contain a pair or more of them, and their nests are the favourite nursery of the Cuckoo. The song of this species is a pleasing one, uttered as the bird descends from a short flight into the air. All through the genial days of a moorland spring the birds may be watched rising and falling, shuttlecock-like, from the heath and cotton-grass. Then, when the nesting season is past, the young and old join into flocks of varying size and betake themselves to the lower ground, appearing in autumn in large numbers in turnip-fields and potato patches. ”

“ The reflection lit up the surrounding rocks, and gleamed upon the armour and the faces of the troops, making them look like fiends in human guise.
What words can describe our feelings as we stood chained and helpless on the brink of Melag, awaiting our hideous doom! The sun already was half-hidden below the mountain-tops behind us in the distant west, and the plain of desolation below was fast cloaking its horrors in the gloom of night. Earth shone as a pale star in the clear sky, and our eyes looked out with yearning love across the realms of space towards her, our home! ”

“ Then comes by far the prettiest sight of all, as the bird swims through each mighty wave just before it turns over and breaks upon the beach, floating light as a foam fleck on the huge rollers, now high up on the white crests, then momentarily lost to view in the green glassy depths. If alarmed on these occasions, the Eider generally swims quickly out from shore, but if further pursued or fired at, it instantly takes wing, rising from the water with little splash, and flying rapidly and steadily just above the surface to a safer refuge. ”

“ They love the swampy portions of the moors—the spacious hollows between the hills, where the wet ground is clothed with a dense growth of rushes, cotton-grass, and sphagnum, amongst which the heath and ling in scattered patches mark the drier portions of the ground. At the first alarm the ever-watchful Plovers rise one after the other from all parts of the waste, and then begins a chorus of flute-like whistling cries, bird after bird taking up the chorus and alarming all other and less demonstrative species within hearing. ”

“ Without you I cannot, will not, live, for life would be but a living death of dark despair. Is there no hope for me? No hope, Volinè dearest? Am I but to review this promised land of happiness from afar off, only to turn my face away from its green pastures for ever? Ah, no, it is too horrible!'
"'My poor Harry, it is as hard for me as for thee; for I love thee as a woman only loves when she doth love, that is with all her soul. No hope can lighten our darkness or leaven our sorrow. ”

“ Between the tides Redshanks often collect on some mud-bank, where in a serried throng they keep up a confused babel of subdued cries, as if all were talking and none listening. Its flight is rapid and most unsteady looking—the black and white wings producing an idea of irregularity which is more imaginary than real. Upon the coast the Redshank feeds on sand-worms, crustaceans, molluscs, and such like marine creatures, but during summer at its breeding-grounds, worms, insects, ground-fruits and berries are among the substances sought. ”

“ We came to this city at once, and yielded ourselves to your authority without resistance, as Kaosp, a worthy captain of your troops, can bear testimony. We are anxious to be friends, to knit together the peoples of Earth and Gathma in tranquil unity. We hold out the hand of brotherhood, the olive branch of peace, from our world to yours. Grasp it in the same spirit in which it is extended towards you, and let each race, strangers now no more, reap the rich harvest of mutual benefits my comrades and myself have dared and done so much to sow! ”

“ The most abundant bird on the loch was the Common Gull, respecting which we shall have more to say on a future page. We saw several pairs of Redshanks near the swollen streams, many Plovers in the distance, a few Dippers, Common Sandpipers, and Mergansers. But the bird that interested us most was an Osprey, flying slowly over the loch about thirty feet above the water. It was hovering with quivering wings, the head almost hidden as the bird peered down in quest of prey. Every few moments the bird flapped its long wings as if to steady itself and gain fresh momentum for its flight. ”

“ Man only knows of beauty such as yours in the holy legends of his heaven; only the angels of his faith are decked in such graces as are yours; but in his mortal life he knows them not, save by imagination, and as they have been revealed to him. Such peerless, queenly beauty as yours, Volinè, no mortal man beheld before; such winning grace, such maidenly charm, are what we men of Earth would call immortal and divine!'
"'Harry, thy words are sweet unto me, and I feel that they flow from thy heart; but I would have thee tell me more of that Love, by which these men of Earth enslave her daughters. ”

“ Sometimes the flock will head straight away down the coast, passing the observer with a rush and whirr of wings, and a chorus of purring cries; at other times a large flock will rise en masse from the muds, pass out to sea a little way, turn, and go some distance along the shore, come back again, repeating the movement time after time, ever and anon appearing as though about to alight, dipping and rising with marvellous regularity. ”

“ Tell me, Harry, more of that mystic world from whence you came. Are the women of that world more fair, more beautiful than we? Doth no maid of Ramos hold thy heart in bondage? Hath not that power you tell me the sons and daughters of earth call Love, yet had no resting-place in thy soul?' And as she spoke these last words, Volinè laid her head upon my breast and gazed up into my face with her radiant love-lit eyes, as though she would read the innermost depths of my soul. ”

“ The steel-blue Swallows and Martins come from the adjoining meadows and park to dart to and fro with shrill twitter, and thread their way beneath the drooping branches of the chestnuts gaily ornamented with their noble spikes of fair yet evil-smelling bloom, like miniature candelabra. The Herons all day long fly up and down from their nests in the tree-tops to and from the shallows, where the roach are an easy prey. How stately the big gray birds look standing so solemn in the shallows! ”

“ It swims lightly enough even on a rough sea, riding like a cork on the wave-crests, and sleeps upon the water, when roaming far from land. Flocks of this Gull may often be seen standing upon the mud-flats or level sandy reaches, preening their plumage, and waiting, it may be, for a turn of the tide that may bring some particular food of which they are in quest. ”

“ The reeds were stupendous, with fluted and flattened stems, eighteen inches in width, rising straight as arrows from the stagnant water, their crowns lost to view in the night haze, and mingling together far above the roof of the Sirius.
The malarious vapours rising from the stagnant water and the rotting vegetation were deadly in their subtleness, and in spite of our ever-increasing excitement and curiosity, Doctor Hermann insisted for our health's sake that we should return to the Sirius. A night amidst such poisonous gases might have stricken each one of us down with a fatal fever. ”

“ First one bird, and then another, will be seen to poise itself, and then, with closed wings, to dash downwards, glinting like a piece of white marble in the sun, into the sea, disappearing for a moment, then rising again into the air to prepare for another descent. ”