Playa

“ We often love to think now of the life of men on beaches,—at least in midsummer, when the weather is serene; their sunny lives on the sand, amid the beach-grass and the bayberries, their companion a cow, their wealth a jag of drift-wood or a few beach-plums, and their music the surf and the peep of the beach-bird.
We went to see the Ocean, and that is probably the best place of all our coast to go to. ”

“ A walk on the beach, whether to the east or the west of the town, is always delightful and interesting. Whether the grand expanse of waters on the one side, its waves breaking in hollow or harmonious melody, and winning us to meditation and calmness,—the stupendous and broken cliffs, forming bold projections, or sinking into shadow, concealing in their breast the spoils of ages,—or the treasures of the pebbly shore be the objects of attraction, there is always enough to amuse, to gratify, and to benefit. ”

“ One was yonder beautiful edifice, now so frequented as a public library; the other was the beach—the roar of which has so often mingled with the worship of this place—my daily resort; dear to me in the sunshine, still more attractive in the storm. Seldom do I visit it now without thinking of the work which there, in the sight of that beauty, in the sound of those waves, was carried on in my soul. No spot on earth has helped to form me so much as that beach. ”

“ Already the mist above, flecked with clustered clouds, flushed with rose colour and dull gold. I heard the low splash of the waves breaking and curling across the beach. A wandering breeze, fresh and fragrant, blew the curtains of my window. There was the scent of sweet bay in the room, and everywhere the subtile, nameless perfume of the sea.
When at last I stood upon the shore, the air and sea were all aglimmer in a rosy light, deepening to crimson in the zenith. Along the beach I saw a little cove, shelving and all ashine, where shallow waves washed with a mellow sound. ”

“ The beach at night has a voice all its own, a sound in fullest harmony with its spirit and mood—with its little, dry noise of sand forever moving, with its solemn, overspilling, rhythmic seas, with its eternity of stars that sometimes seem to hang down like lamps from the high heavens—and that sound the piping of a bird. As I walk the beach in early summer my solitary coming disturbs it on its nest, and it flies away, troubled, invisible, piping its sweet, plaintive cry. The bird I write of is the piping plover, Charadrius melodus, sometimes called the beach plover or the mourning bird. ”

“ Up and up the beach it marches with a majestic will that nothing else in the world is like; as it comes it lifts itself higher and higher; then the wave leaps into the air and its crest is turned to emerald as the sunlight strikes through it for the pause of another instant, there is a roll, a mad plunge, the spray dashes high above your head, the foam floats and flies up the beach to your very feet, the hollow rumble of the water sounds fainter and farther along the sands, and the ocean draws itself back away from you and away from the land. ”

“ I frequently amused myself by walking for miles on the sandy beach, and picking up some of the pretty shells among the millions that lay scattered along. It is as fine a walk as a pensive maiden, in contemplative mood, could desire. On the one hand, is the ever-toiling ocean, whose waves break upon the sand bars, and in giddy globes of foam, lash the shore, and spend their force beneath your feet: on the other, a low, sandy bluff, and then an extended lawn, stretching far away into the interior, and its utmost verge skirted with stately forest trees ”

“ It is a vast, rank, lusty place, this beach of ours, strewn with horseshoes and crabs, and razor-clams, and whatever wrecks the sea casts up; corpses of men and beasts bleaching and rotting in the sun and waves,—and each tide turns them in their beds, and brings fresh sand to be their pillows. ”

“ The beach, where the great rollers of the Pacific dash in, was magnificent; but one cannot safely bathe thereon. The water is heroically cold, and the surf too fierce and heavy for ordinary mortals. The sea water, warmed, tamed, and confined in a bath-house, is what is safest to take. ”

“ Toward a beach, somewhere about the centre of the island, our course was laid, and upon coming to the shallows, the girls shipped their paddles and sprang into the water, when, with others helping them, they ran the canoe on to the beach, making no more of my weight than if I had been a child.
I now observed among the woods of the, very ancient stone buildings, which, at one time, must have been occupied by a people possessing a high state of civilization. ”

“ There is the wide, gradually shelving beach, ceaselessly washed by the rolling surf, crowded with people of all ages and stations, bobbing in the water, frolicking on the beach, or sedately seated in the shaded chairs. Back on the beach runs the long line of hotels and cottages that we find at all great ocean resorts. ”

“ It seems that instantly the beach was populated with men with blankets, clothes, and flasks, and women with coffee-pots and all the remedies sacred to their minds. The welcome of the land to the men from the sea was warm and generous, but a still and dripping shape was carried slowly up the beach, and the land's welcome for it could only be the different and sinister hospitality of the grave.
When it came night, the white waves paced to and fro in the moonlight, and the wind brought the sound of the great sea's voice to the men on shore, and they felt that they could then be interpreters. ”

“ Madly they would dart to and fro until midday, then rush for the beach. She found it even more amusing to see these crowds of men and women disporting on the well-kept beach and in the sea that looked so well-kept also; the men, of amazingly varied shapes—bereft of all elegance by their scant attire; the women more elegant than ever, with the décolletage of charming legs, and wearing fantastic headgear that made them look like great sea-poppies and bluets blooming on the tawny sand—or flying, as though wind-blown, in the swing. ”

“ Yet winter and summer, even when the thousands upon thousands of bathers cover the sand like a shower of confetti and when there are shouts and circus excitements along the beach, people who look at the lake seem always to become sad. ”

“ A little inland, the beach gives way to dry sand-hills, blown about by the wind, and over-grown by patches of blue-green marram-grass and other sandy seaside weeds. If you lie down on one of these sand-hills, choosing a spot not quite so dirty as its neighbours, you will soon be amused by seeing a curious little comedy going on perpetually around you in every direction. ”

“ Still she was alone. This was a beach used by bathers and there were bath-houses near; the apparatus of swings and benches stood in the sands and there were posts with life-lines strung in the water; but bath-houses, benches and swings, the beach and the water all were deserted on this calm, October midnight. The moon tipped them with glistening gray and they stood quiet for their silvering, except the water which flecked duller and brighter as it lapped its complaint at the shore. ”

“ Although the shore looks to the east, and does not get the prevailing southern breeze, and the beach has little surf, both water and air are mild, the bathing is safe and agreeable, and the view of the illimitable sea dotted with sails and fishing-boats is always pleasing. A crowd begets a crowd, and soon the world's people made a city larger than the original one, and still more fantastic, by the aid of paint and the jigsaw. ”

“ To sea-side naturalists it must be a matter of great surprise that of the inhabitants of our coast towns and villages, and of the pleasure-seekers that swarm on various parts of the coast during the holiday season, so few take a real interest in the natural history of the shore. The tide flows and ebbs and the restless waves incessantly roll on the beach without arousing a thought as to the nature and cause of their movements. The beach itself teems with peculiar forms of life that are scarcely noticed except when they disturb the peace of the resting visitor. ”

“ Dizzy precipices of chalk stand like sugar-loaves against the blue sky, here and there cleft in a tortuous, yawning chasm. Beneath, the beach seems to slumber, so gentle is that lisping murmur, where the long billowy swell washes the face of the skerries, and lifts up and down their heavy fringe of tangle like a giant’s beard. ”

“ There lies a beach, upon which the surf is breaking in long, white swells; and there are the trees upon the sides and summits of the hills. What a world of new and curious objects we are about to behold! What a variety of trees and other plants and flowers and fruits! What grand and beautiful scenery! ”

“ The beach is perfectly dry, but at every step he takes, as soon as he lift his foot, the print which it leaves fills with water. The eye, however, has noticed no change; the immense strand is smooth and tranquil; all the sand has the same appearance; nothing distinguishes the surface which is solid from that which is no longer so; the joyous little crowd of sandflies continue to leap tumultuously over the wayfarer’s feet. ”

“ You see deep, dark places amongst the lights; there are the park lands. Then raise your eyes and look farther west; there is the sea. It shines as a silver mirror. The soft winds from the west are blowing, and the wavelets, dancing in the light of the moon, play with her shining rays as they leap on to break gently on the sandy beach. ”

“ Nor is it less beautiful, when the breeze is gentle, to watch the waves rolling majestically in, the hot sun shining through the long well-dressed line as if it were through purest glass of the brightest sea-green, and then to observe the rearing crests tumbling grandly over as they charge to the death and deliver themselves one after another on the rocky beach, which with a calm steadiness receives the shock. ”

“ For once more, and once more unconsciously, we were within hail of fellow-creatures, and that vacant beach was but a pistol-shot from the capital city of the archipelago. But the life of an atoll, unless it be enclosed, passes wholly on the shores of the lagoon; it is there the villages are seated, there the canoes ply and are drawn up; and the beach of the ocean is a place accursed and deserted, the fit scene only for wizardry and shipwreck, and in the native belief a haunting ground of murderous spectres. ”

“ The beach of such a pure dazzling white, backed by the tall, green cocoa-nut trees, waving their spreading heads to the fresh breeze, the dark blue of the sky, and the deeper blue of the transparent sea, occasionally varied into green as we passed by the coral rocks which threw their branches out from the bottom—the town opening to our view by degrees, houses after houses, so neat, with their green jalousies, dotting the landscape, the fort with the colours flying, troops of officers riding down, a busy population of all colours, relieved by the whiteness of their dress. ”

“ It was a peculiarity of the beach that there was one spot where the wood came ashore in abundance—great trees that had been uprooted by the rains and carried out into the lake, ships' timbers, the loosened planks of derelicts, and all the wreckage of storms and freshets. ”

“ These sand hills are the most striking features of the Beach. The biggest of them are not more than sixty feet high, yet so hard a feat is it to climb to the top, and so extended is the view below you—on one side the wide Bay, on the other, the 13 ocean stretching its restless surface to the horizon—that you feel yourself upon an elevation tenfold as high. ”

“ The bay, as far as we have seen, is free from danger; the beach is lined by a feathery row of beautiful casuarinas, and behind is a tangled jungle, without fine timber; game is plentiful, from the traces we saw on the sand ”

“ Turn you seaward, at low tide there lies sand again and shingle (albeit but a narrow beach, for here a depth of water sinks rapidly) laved with relentless obstinacy by long, furling, growling rollers that are grey at their sluggish base and emerald-lighted at their curvetting crest. ”

“ We drove along the shore on a road of fine green turf, skirting the lovely calm lagoon, and passing by an endless succession of small wooden houses, each almost hidden in bowers of blossom and shady fruit-trees, with pleasant lawns, where merry children played, while their elders sat or lay on mats sewing, or twining wreaths, or rolling cigarettes—all suggesting lives of easy-going happiness without undue care ”

“ The beach is full of interesting little colour subjects. The air is clear, and the water reflects the light; bright caps and frocks, sails and seaweed, and the striped tents and scarlet buckets are all most attractive. ”

“ And not a living being anywhere around, except us. And the beach is the loveliest beach I ever dreamed of—and you see it is the first real beach I have ever seen. It is wide and hard and part of it is wet where the big waves roll in and it moans beautifully. And there are lots of little funny flowers, like wild sweet peas, and pretty grasses grow on it and the sand up away from the water is white and glistens like jewels. ”

“ From what I know of this bay, I am prepared to say that there is a surf breaking on the beach at this moment which no boat of ours could pass through and live. Listen to the wind, how it howls through our rigging! ”

“ The beach she left, which less and less appears.
The courser, who was swimming to the right,
After a mighty sweep, the lady bears
To shore, where rock and cavern shag the brink,
As night upon the land begins to sink. ”

“ It was nine o’clock in the morning, and when they reached the reef and tied up, the sea was half out and the pools showed, flashing like shields in the morning sun.
Spray and the fume of beach filled the air, and the crying of gulls, and the everlasting murmur of the surf. Out here one’s environment was completely altered: the still lagoon, the mirrored trees, the foliage and earth scents changing to thunderous sea, blinding coral and sea breeze scented by beach and wave. There the coloured birds passed softly across the groves, here the sea gulls charged down the wind. ”