Walter Colton

“ All hands are at work getting our ship ready for port. She is being scoured from stem to stern, outside and in. Every soil on her paint is obliged to yield to soap and clean water; and every weather-stain on her rigging is removed. She will look neat as a bride approaching the nuptial altar. What is there more beautiful on earth than a young and guileless being thus timidly intrusting her destiny to the hands of another,—leaving her home, her father, mother, brothers and sisters, for a hearth which another love has lighted, and where other hopes are to bud and bloom? ”

“ We have been in a calm the greater part of the day. The mirror of the ocean has been broken only by the plunges of a huge whale. He rose at times within a few fathoms of our ship, blowing the brine almost into the faces of our crew. They would, if permitted, have retaliated with their harpoons; though the result would have been only the loss of their weapons, for the monster would have carried them off with as much ease as Samson the bodkins of Delilah. He tumbled around us for several hours, as if measuring his size and strength with that of our frigate. ”

“ Another Sabbath morn has poured its holy light on land and sea. On land, the stir of the village and the tumult of the great city have ceased. Men walk softly in the prelude of that rest which remains to the good. Sacred truth melts on their hearts like dew. No community in a Christian land can be utterly bereft of moral influence. If it has none from within, there is a pressure from without. The moral as well as physical atmosphere tends to an equilibrium. Righteous Lot may have fled from Sodom, but his warning voice rolled back upon the wind to the doomed city. ”

“ It is a great comfort to me to find among the crew here and there one of earnest piety. His example flashes out like a star from a sky of cloud and storm. God grant these lights may be multiplied till our whole horizon shall be lit with their steady splendors.
Mrs. Ten Eyke, the wife of our consul on board, whose health has been for some time delicate, is gradually sinking. How cold the grave to one so young, to whom the earth seems so fair, and life so full of joyous pulses! O death! to thy unbreathing realm glide silently away the beautiful and the beloved. ”

“ We can only carry our storm try-sails; and even their strength is tested to the last thread. The whole ocean is white with foam, which falls in cataracts from the crests of soaring waves. It is terrible and sublime to watch one of these huge combers heaving up within the horizon, and rolling mast high upon you. Niagara gazed at from the boiling abyss, is its only parallel. The hail is driving upon our deck, the sea breaking over our bows, and a starless night closing in. Yet a spirit of cheerfulness and alacrity in duty animates all. ”

“ We have a stiff wind to-day from the southeast, and we are running, close hauled, under reefed topsails. The sea is high, and every now and then a huge wave throws its curling crest through some half-closed port, as a wolf pounces into a sheep-fold, or as the arch adversary o’erleaped the green wall of Eden. Though we are any thing but Eden, with its beauty and its bliss: our first parent would have had but little cause of regret, if, in resigning Eden, he had relinquished only the habitudes of a sea-life. ”

“ We have sent down our top-gallant yards, and set our try-sails. Sleet and hail are falling, and the night has closed over us in starless gloom.
Against the night-storm, you who dwell on the land can close your shutters, and retire in safety to repose. That storm summons the sailor from his hammock to the yards. There, on that giddy elevation, with his masts sweeping from sea to sea, the tempest roaring through his shrouds, the thunder bursting overhead, the waves howling beneath, and the quick lightning scorching the eyeballs that meet its glare, the poor sailor attempts to reef sail. ”

“ We have the wind directly aft. Our fore studding-sails are out like the wings of a bird on the breast of a gale. We have run within the last two days four hundred and forty miles. This is good sailing considering we have six months’ provision on board, and lie consequently too deep for the greatest speed. The air is balmy, and the songs of our sailors, at sunset, rose exultingly into its blue depths. A sailor always sings with heart. His music rolls out like a dashing stream from its mountain source. It is never gay; it always has a deep vein of melancholy. ”

“ Many families, and among them some of the first in Lima, have thus been plunged in irretrievable humiliation and grief. The cause may be, and generally is, carefully concealed. But an unseen wound may rankle as deeply as that which has no covering. The light which a mother should depend upon to guide the steps of her daughter, is that which is reflected from her own example. If shadows rest on this—if it falls only in transient flakes, seen one moment and lost the next, like the firefly’s fitful beam—it will only serve the more to bewilder and betray. ”

“ Nothing can be less certain than a ship’s progress. Even those winds deemed regular and almost infallible by mariners, seem now and then infected with the last degree of fickleness and perversity.
We have now been thirty-six days at sea without an isle or promontory to break the dim horizon, or relieve the vast rolling waste of waters. Harmony and good feeling prevail among the officers. There has not been the slightest clash of feeling between our Captain and those who carry on duty under him. And yet the most energetic forms of discipline have been maintained. ”

“ It is now blowing a gale, and we have all sails furled except our close-reefed main-top and storm try-sails. The sea is running high, and the huge combers, shaking the foam from their crests, are rushing down upon us like a host of cavalry frothing at the bit. The sun is sinking in cold dim light, and seems to abandon the ocean to the lashing tempest.
Such is the life of the sailor: one hour is full of sunshine, the next of storms. He lives between hope and disappointment: they alternate through his whole existence. ”

“ We must part with the wind as we approach the equator, and perhaps before. But sufficient to the day is the evil thereof. It is much wiser rightly to enjoy the blessings of the present, than to yield ourselves to anxieties about the contingencies of the future.
We have a beautiful sunset. The air is serene, and the blue circle of the sky rests in tranquil softness on the utmost verge of the ocean. The whole realm of waters seems cradled in its limitless sweep. The rays of the descending orb lie along the gently heaving billows in lines of level light. ”

“ We have in the sick-bay a sailor, James Mills, who must die. He may survive a few days longer, and must then go. He is in the prime of life, and a few months ago ranked among the most athletic on our decks. He is now but the shadow of the past, and hovers dimly on the verge of life. The night of that narrow house is not all dark to him; some rays of light reach it from the Cross. These are now all that can cheer him; they are all that can cheer the descending footsteps of the proudest monarch. Into death’s domain the honors and friendships of earth cannot enter ”

“ Though the sea is rough, and the roll of the ship deep, we have had divine service. Even a brief service is much better than none. It is a recognition of the sanctity of the Sabbath, and of our obligations to that Being whose guardian care is our defence.
If dependence can awaken the voice of supplication, the sailor, of all men, should be the most devout. His poor frail bark floats between life and death. A sudden tempest, a latent rock, or a spark of fire, and he sinks into a strangling grave. He may emerge, but it is only to strike his strong arms in wild despair. ”

“ This is beautiful sailing; a soft, balmy atmosphere, a smooth sea, and a breeze that carries us seven and eight knots the hour. We have not taken in our studding-sails for several days; while our royals seemed to have entered into an agreement with our broad pennant to stand or come down together. The day is not darkened by clouds, and the night is filled with the soft light of the moon. The stars come out from the blue vault of heaven, and blaze with a distinctness and force that makes each one seem some central source of exhaustless and unquenchable splendor. ”

“ There is nothing around to distract the attention, or win a diverted thought. Around rolls or rests the melancholy main—above stretches the blue heaven, and over all reigns that Supreme Intelligence, at whose fiat resplendent worlds rolled from chaotic night. All is vast and awful, like that state of being into which we are ushered at death. It is this that makes the sailor religious, and inspires him with respect for all the great truths which throw their light through the night of the grave. ”

“ The sunset clouds on which we had gazed, the towering crags where morn first broke, and the brilliant constellations which faith had peopled with the spirits of the pure and meek, all went down in dying pomp over the dim horizon. What now to us Niagara’s thunder, or the rush of the Alpine avalanche! Even the polar star, that has poured its steady light for ages on the ruins of pyramids, the wrecks of temples, and the graves of empires, has left its watch-tower in darkness,—all are lost in the shoreless ocean of night. ”

“ The black clouds which hovered in the western horizon last evening, hung their banners of darkness over the descending sun, as if impatient of the presence of that orb in the frightful work which they purposed. Before his level rays had left the ocean, their waiting squadrons began to rally. One black cohort after another filed into the ranks, till they presented a solid mass of impetuous strength. Thus compact, they moved down upon the plane of the trembling sea. When opening to the right and left, a tempest rushed forth, which seemingly nothing but the stable mountains could withstand. ”

“ They flow together with a congeniality of spirit, which is the source of a thousand pleasures to them as well as the stranger. Their society is the all-redeeming charm of Valparaiso. Their hospitality is open as the day, and warm as their soft clime. You forget in their company the rude rocks and barren hills around you. The earth without may be covered with brambles, but you feel for the time in a sort of Eden whose flowers have escaped the primal malediction. I do not wonder that this is the favorite port with the officers of the Pacific squadron. ”

“ The life of a sailor is brief enough at best. Even with all the care which you can bestow upon his habits, and with all the restraints you can exert upon his headlong career, he soon reaches his goal. You seldom meet with a grayheaded sailor. Long before age can have frosted his locks, the icy hand of death has been laid on his heart. He dies in the midst of his days, and often in his full strength. He perishes like his ship, which the tempest hath cast on the rocks. ”

“ The architecture of man here is so inferior to that of nature, it ought to make an apology whenever it shows itself. It is like the tent of an Arab throwing up its dirty cone beneath the magnificent umbrage of the palm. It is said the genius of a people is in harmony with the scenery in the midst of which they have been reared; but here is scenery that might almost throw sunbows over the dreams of the dead, and architecture sombre enough to send even a Quaker to sleep. Such is the aspect of the city as seen from our frigate, swinging at her anchors in front of the imperial palace. ”

“ The great plain at the eastern end of the town is alive with groups that have collected to witness or participate in the fun. The variety of colors, which blended their hues in Joseph’s coat, hold no comparison with the motley dyes which flare up here in the costume of the crowd. They resemble the tints of the forest, when the autumn’s breath has touched its leaves with frost; the foam of ocean breaking over their coral reef is not more tumultuous than the roar and rush of these living tides. ”

“ Came tumbling through the ocean,
So like the cape in hue and shape
Our crew, who watched its motion,
While rounding-to beneath our lee,
Declared the Cape had put to sea. Sunday, Feb. 8. The severity of the weather and the heave of the sea prevent our holding divine service to-day. May each heart silently erect within itself an altar on which to offer the oblations of contrition, gratitude, and faith. Religion is a mission from Heaven to the heart of man; and when taken away from that heart, and shrined in stately temples and sumptuous altars, it loses its vitality and power. ”

“ Our sweet southwest breeze still continues, and we are moving on under an easy sail seven knots the hour. There is not a greater folly on the ocean than for a man-of-war to be crowding on sail, as if speed were the all-predominant 34motive. This will do for a merchantman, when a market is to be reached as soon as possible; but for a national ship, bound on a three years’ cruise, it is a miserable exhibition of impatience. Indeed, in all the affairs of human life moderation is true philosophy. Our energies will give way soon enough without any forced action. ”

“ The bay, studded with picturesque islands, circles up bold and beautiful some thirty miles into the main land. The shore presents here a glittering beach, which retreats into the green recesses of a deep ravine, and is there overhung by some stupendous cliff, which throws its dark shadows below. The whole bay is like a resplendent lake looking to heaven amid Alpine pinnacles. High above all soars the steep Corcovada, where plays the first blush of morn, and where the dying day lingers; while the Organ mountains, with their sharp peaks, pour down the harmony of the winds. ”

“ You find a barber: his dull shears hang in the knots of your hair like a sheep-shearer’s in a fleece matted with burrs—his razor he straps on the leg of his boot, and then hauls away—starting at every pull some new fountain of tears. You vow you will let the beard go—but then one side is partly off, and you try the agony again to get the other side something like it; and now what is the charge for this torture—four dollars! Night is approaching, and you must have a place where you can sleep: to inquire for a bed would be as idle as to hunt a pearl in the jungle of a Greenland bear. ”