Coasting

“ Leaving Aarār and coasting southward, the shore is very low and sandy, with apparently no danger. A low ridge of hills extends along the coast from one to three miles distance from it. Some few of these hills are covered with vegetation, and now and then a straggling flock of goats or sheep may be met with; but otherwise no supplies of any kind are to be procured until you arrive at [vii] Zafferan—firewood excepted, which may be obtained from the wrecks upon the beach in large quantities. ”

“ Coasting undoubtedly exists; birds, day migrants especially, may be observed following coastlines in steady flight, though a mile or less inland no passage is visible. On the North Norfolk coast I have seen little parties of swallows passing along the shore in spring, coasting slowly but steadily from east to west. ”

“ It always seems to be telling me something, Winter or Summer."
"I love it in the Summer," said Nan, "but in the Winter it seems so cold and cruel."
"That is because you do not know it as well as I do," said Dorothy.
Hal, Harry, and Bert had fine times together. There was no skating, and the little flurry of snow there had been was not enough for coasting, but they had other fun. ”

“ At such times he would wonder how the tide stood in the estuary at home. Was the flood swirling up from the Channel, bringing with its clear eddies the smell of the ocean as it hurried in and out among the piles of the old pier? Or was it the time of the ebb when stretches of damp sand come out at the foot of cliffs and when ridges of rock, dripping with cool weed, emerge once more into the sun? What a moment for a swim! ”

“ An iron coast, bleak, black, and desolate, without harborage for so much as a catboat for leagues to north or south. A coast so pitiless, so lashed forever by the long, sullen rollers of the North Atlantic, so tormented by the shifting and treacherous currents of the tide between its chains of outlying rocky islets, that no ship ever ventured willingly within miles of its uncompromising menace. A coast so little favored by summer that even in glowing August the sun could reach it seldom through its cold and drenching fogs. ”

“ We are accustomed to thinking of a coast as a definite, narrow shore-line; but to the inhabitants of the Hudson Bay region the word conveys a very different meaning. There the coast is a broad mud and boulder flat, several miles in width, always wet, and twice during the day flooded by the tide. At this time of the year the mud flats were covered by rough broken ice and drifted snow, but above high-tide mark the surface of the country was level and the walking good. For several [231] hours we tramped southward down the coast, with the cutting wind in our faces. ”

“ On the blue background of the high coast they seem to float on silvery patches of calm water, arid and grey, or dark green and rounded like clumps of evergreen bushes, with the larger ones, a mile or two long, showing the outlines of ridges, ribs of grey rock under the dank mantle of matted leafage. Unknown to trade, to travel, almost to geography, the manner of life they harbour is an unsolved secret. ”

“ The weather has scoured the coast—a thousand miles of it—as clean as an old bone: it is utterly sterile, save for a tuft or two of hardy grass and wide patches of crisp moss; bare gray rocks, low in the south, towering and craggy in the north, everywhere blasted by frost, lie in billowy hills between the froth and clammy mist of the sea and the starved forest at the edge of the inland wilderness. ”

“ And on the coast there are many land breezes, and frequent changes in the sea breezes. They navigate their ships in the summer, and in the winter they draw them up on shore, and cover them up on account of the heavy falls of rain. ”

“ We have heard of the famished people blackening the shores, like the crew of some vessel wrecked on an inhospitable coast, that they might sustain life by the shell-fish and sea-weed laid bare by the ebb. Many of their allotments, especially on the western coast, were barren in the extreme—unsheltered by bush or tree, and exposed to the sweeping sea-winds, and in time of tempest, to the blighting spray ”

“ The Firth closes gradually together before you, the coast runs in a series of the most beautifully moulded bays, hill after hill, wooded and softly outlined, trends away in front till the two shores join together. When the tide is out there are great, gleaming flats of wet sand, over which the gulls go flying and crying ”

“ The coast lines are singularly beautiful, with their round bosses, rich in bush and glade, while the shore presents a bold outline, with projecting bluffs thickly covered with jungle, and long stretches of lands broken by rocky floors and reef, on which the surf of the Indian Ocean majestically breaks. ”

“ The worst is, that till these inlets are better known, one has, as it were, to fish for anchorage. There are several lurking rocks on the coast, but happily none of them lie far from land, the approach to which may be known by sounding, supposing the weather so obscure that you cannot see it. For to judge of the whole by the parts we have sounded, it is more than probable that there are soundings all along the coast, and for several leagues out to sea. ”

“ On such a coast, Nature never confuses her effects—no lively verdure or picturesque landscape intrudes upon the majesty of the sea—only damp mosses and stout creepers veil the harsh outlines of the rocks, and, in the distance, masses of pine trees relieve the gray monotony of the shore—for the rest, everything is left to the sun and the sea. ”

“ The effect produced by the contrast between the rugged, iron, sterile coast beheld from the sea, and the loveliness of deep blue water and summer islands richly wooded, and green hills sloping to the water’s edge, and sandy creeks, with the heavy bush to the right, and the tropical splendour of vegetation that meets the eye upon the outlying land—all which form the noble bay into which you pass through the narrowest and most repellent of headlands—is not to be described. ”

“ The coast appears straight and uniform, having no inlets or bays; the ground, from the shore, rises in hills of a moderate elevation, behind which are ranges of mountains, whose summits were lost in the clouds. The whole scene was entirely covered with snow, except the sides of some of the cliffs, which rose too abruptly from the sea for the snow to lie upon them.
The wind continued blowing very strong from the north-east, with thick hazy weather and sleet, from the 24th till the 28th. During the whole time, the thermometer was never higher than 301⁄2°. ”

“ Now, amidst these ruins, there are many patches of rich soil, which are carefully laid out in plantations, and the neighbouring sea abounds with a variety of most excellent fish, with which, as well as with other provisions, we were always plentifully supplied. Off this part of the coast, we could find no ground at less than a cable’s length from the shore, with a hundred and sixty fathoms of line, excepting in a small bight to the eastward of the south point, where we had regular soundings of fifty and fifty-eight fathoms over a bottom of fine sand. ”

“ On the left hand, facing oceanward, the coast is a labyrinth of mountain fiords, straits, and bays, where you may see great craggy shoulders and domed summits waver in their crystal calm at the flick of a gull’s dipping wing, or add to the terror of the tempest as they start out black and unmoved behind rifts of swirling mists. ”

“ The coast, to the northward, is formed of detached 81hills, rising perpendicularly from the sea, with ragged and broken summits; the sides covered with wood, and the valleys between them of a fertile and well cultivated appearance. To the southward, we saw an extensive bay, bounded by a low point of land to the south-east which was covered with cocoa-nut trees; and off it stood a high insulated rock, about a mile from the shore. The haziness of the weather prevented our seeing distinctly the land to the southward of the point ”

“ To the east, the coast retires into a semicircular rocky recess, terminating seawards in a lofty, dark-browed precipice, and bristling, throughout all its extent, with a countless multitude of crags, that, at every heave of the wave, break the surface into a thousand eddies. ”

“ Along this lovely coast the vessel moved through the sparkling green ripples. Not the faintest white fleck of cloud was now in the sky, and the sunlight falling downwards upon the island, brought out every brown rock of the coast in bold relief against the brilliant green of the slope. So close to the shore the vessel passed, the nearer cliffs appeared to glide away as the land in their shade was disclosed, and this effect of soft motion was entrancing to all who experienced it. ”

“ THE HALTING STEP. Chapter I.
n the Western coast of one of the islands in the Channel group is a level reach of salt marshes, to which the sea rises only at the highest spring tides, and which at other times extends as far as the eye can see, a dreary waste of salt pools, low rocks, and stretches of sand, yielding its meagre product of shell-fish, samphire, and sea-weed to the patient toil of the fisher-folk that dwell in scattered huts along the shore. ”

“ In many places the coast is rock-bound, or, more properly, clinker-bound; tumbled masses of blackish or greenish stuff like the dross of an iron furnace, forming dark clefts and caves here and there, into which a ceaseless sea pours a fury of foam, overhanging them with a swirl of gray, haggard mist, amidst which sail screaming flights of unearthly birds heightening the dismal din. ”

“ A ship flung in a storm towards the shore has no chance on the jagged rocks that spur-like, jut out from the cliffs, and the tide races inshore with terrific power, even when it is not driven by a wild south-westerly wind. This part of the coast was naturally a happy hunting-ground for smugglers, and was not altogether innocent of wreckers. ”

“ The dangerous nature of the coast, and the surrounding seas, is owing to sunken rocks, strong currents and tides, which vary from day to day. It requires a life-long apprenticeship to become well acquainted with all the hidden and open perils which threaten a seaman’s life. No wonder then if some of our fishermen, brought up to the sea from their earliest youth, become experienced and fearless pilots, knowing every reef, every set of the tide, and able to reckon to a nicety, how long the current will run in one direction, and when it may be [481] expected to take a different course. ”

“ We returned to the Factory, along a coast the most dangerous to navigate that can possibly be conceived, from fragments of rocks being studded in the water for miles from the shore, and which are only visible at the reflux of the tide. The safest course to take is to run out to sea, and sail along out of sight of land; but this is hazardous in an open boat, if the weather be stormy, or the water is much ruffled by the wind. ”

“ The effect of this over-balance of sinking, or resultant shrinking of the earth’s shell, may be to compress the mountain district and so cause the shore line to move landward at the same time that it moves upward (Fig. 280) .
The sunk or embayed coast.—When now, upon the other hand, a section of the coast line sinks with reference to the sea, the water invades all the near-shore valleys, thus “drowning” them and yielding the drowned river mouth or estuary. ”

“ Curious are the transformations visible down this coast from disintegration. Often gigantic columns and huge masses of rock and marl are left standing in the sea, like champions from whom the main line of cliff, which does battle against the waves, has retired. ”

“ Where the coast is iron-bound, in delightful little bays and inlets—those sea-pools lovely to look down upon—one may watch the eiders feeding on the rocks, and try, through the glasses, to make out exactly what they are getting. ”

“ This closer examination, however, only showed me a greater number of rocks, reefs, and breakers, with which, I may say, the coast is universally lined. There are numberless entrances, and constant shelter inside, but the openings and anchorages are dangerous, from the number of isolated and hidden rocks, which rise abruptly from a depth of some fathoms, to within a few feet of the surface. With the greatest precaution, being seldom without two persons on the look out, the vessel sometimes touched on some of them, but never to hurt. ”

“ The long low line of coast that stretched upon their left hand was at times obscured by a blue mist. The water was the colour of mud, and the sky threatened rain. The wretched craft to which they had entrusted themselves was leaking in four places. If caught in one of the frequent storms which ravaged that iron-bound coast, she could not live an hour. ”

“ That such a narrow spit of shifting sand should exist so tenaciously on a part of the coast suffering so much from the inroads of the sea appears most remarkable until we realize that its existence is probably the result of the erosion of the shore to the north, combined with the opposed action of river and ocean. ”

“ Those who succeed in their object of reaching the shore have still the greatest danger to encounter. The coast being guarded by a chain of rocks, with here and there a small opening between them, they are obliged to steer their board through one of these, or, in case of failure, to quit it before they reach the rocks, and, plunging under the wave, make the best of their way back again. ”

“ As the coast advances, and at the same time spreads itself southward, it unites to its luxuriant richness a bolder character, and, rising like a vast amphitheatre, it opposes a barrier to western storms, while it presents its undulating bosom to the sun, and collecting his rays, pours them again with multiplied effect, upon every part of the surrounding country. ”