Wave

“ Fastening our attention for the moment on surface water waves, the first question we shall ask ourselves is—What is a wave? If we take our station on a high cliff looking down on the sea, on some clear day, when the wind is fresh, we see the waves on its surface like green rounded ridges racing forward, and it appears at first sight as if these elevations were themselves moving masses of water. ”

“ The wave which is breaking into foam, which is rippling over the pebbles, which throws up the broken water, which falls back on to the land and makes music, sound, melody as it breaks—that is the wave which is nearly over; it is the wave whose course is run. ”

“ He is inevitably marked, to ear and eye, as the legendary ninth wave, the foamiest green breaker of the line, ever re-forming and breaking, so long as he is visible, brighter, taller, and farther in-shore than the rest. ”

“ So the white spray rushes along the low broken wall of rocks, the sun gleams on the flying fragments of the wave, again it sinks, and the rhythmic motion holds the mind, as an invisible force holds back the tide. ”

“ A careful observer can in this school of Nature instruct himself in all the laws of wave-motion, and gather a fund of knowledge on this subject during an hour’s dalliance at low tide on some sandy coast, or in the quiet study of seaside pools, the surface of which is corrugated with trains of ripples by the breeze. ”

“ What a significant symbol is afforded by the wave! There is much in life, in history, and in all nature that is typified by it. We have cold waves and hot waves, and in the spring and fall migrations of the birds we have “bird waves.” Earthquake shocks go in waves and circles; how often our views and conceptions of things are expressed by the circle! It is a symbol of most profound meaning. It helps us to understand how the universe is finally inexplicable; that there is neither beginning nor end, and that it retreats forever into itself. ”

“ WE have all stood many times by the seashore, watching the waves, crested with white foam, roll in and break upon the rocks or beach. Every one has more than once cast a stone upon still water in a lake or pond, and noticed the expanding rings of ripples; and some have voyaged over stormy seas, whereon great ships are tossed by mighty billows with no more seeming effort than the rocking of a cradle. In all these things we have been spectators of a wave-motion, as it is called, taking place upon a water surface. ”

“ The crest of a wave falls over a portion of air, imprisoning it for a moment, and the mingled air and water of different densities prevent the light of the sun or sky from going straight down into the black depths and being lost, but by being reflected and turned back it shows like beautiful white lace, constantly created and dissolved with a thousandfold more beauty than any that ever came from human hands. ”

“ As they sped on, lurching, jumping, piercing a broken wall of wave and spray like a torpedo, shooting an almost sheer fall, she came to rely on a sense of intuition rather than memory, for night had transformed the waters. ”

“ When the poet calls this the wave of the world, you must not understand world to mean our planet only, but the universe, the cosmos; and the wave is the great wave of impermanency, including all forces of time and death and life and pain. ”

“ But every wave seems as full of joy as though for it alone was the moonlight sent, and as though there were not unnumbered millions of waves to succeed it. Every little wave leaps up as it comes under the light, and smiles toward the round-faced orb above, who seems to smile back upon it. ”

“ Bursts as a wave that from the cloud impends, And, swell’d with tempests, on the ship descends; White are the decks with foam; the winds aloud Howl o’er the masts, and sing through every shroud: Pale, trembling, tired, the sailors freeze with fears; And instant death on every wave appears. ”

“ Water and air both testify to the slightest movement. Not a ripple stirred by the passing breeze or by the freighted ship cleaving the sea, which is not prolonged to a thousand shores, leaving behind an endless progeny, so long as ocean endures. Not a wave of air set in motion by the human voice, which is not prolonged likewise into unknown space. But these watery and aërial pulses typify the acts of Man. ”

“ So a wave rises, catches the light, transmits its motion, and sinks back into sea. So a plant ascends from clay, unfolds its leaves to light and air, flowers, seeds, and becomes clay again. Only, the wave has no knowledge ”

“ So though the name and form of wave could never be without water that was fashioned into the wave by them, yet the name and form themselves were not the wave. They die as soon as ever it returns to water. ”

“ If one could but arrest the connoisseurs in the fact of looking at them with belief, and, magically introducing the image of a true sea-wave, let it roll up to them through the room,—one massive fathom's height and rood's breadth of brine, passing them by but once,—dividing, Red Sea-like, on right hand and left,—but at least setting close before their eyes, for once in inevitable truth, what a sea-wave really is ”

“ If we could see the particles of the air in the concert-room, and fasten our attention upon any one of them, we should see it executing a most complicated motion under the combined action of these air-wave-producing instruments. We should be fascinated by the amazing dance of molecules to and fro and from side to side, as the medley of waves of compression or rarefaction embraced them and drove them hither and thither in their resistless grasp. ”

“ No artist had ever before studied the wave motions in an exact and scientific manner, so as to understand the relations of one wave to another and of all to the undercurrents and the wind and the tide, and all those varied forces which make the water on one shore, or under one sky, so different from the water on another shore or under another sky. ”

“ You climb wave after high wave, and are not swallowed up as you expected. You wait, between guns, for the boom and the shock of the next, with a passionate anticipation, as you wait for the next wave. ”

“ The river and its waves are one surf: where is the difference between the river and its waves?
When the wave rises, it is the water; and when it falls, it is the same water again. Tell me, Sir, where is the distinction?
Because it has been named as wave, shall it no longer be considered as water?
Within the Supreme Brahma, the worlds are being told like beads:
Look upon that rosary with the eyes of wisdom. ”

“ Their chief object has been to show you that the swiftly moving ocean waves, which dash and roll unceasingly against the coast-lines of our island home, are only instances of one form of wave-motion, of which we find other varieties in other media, giving rise to all the entrancing effects of sound and light. In these expositions we have been able to do no more than touch the fringe of a great subject. ”

“ As the wave travels, this water obligingly heaps itself into the wave, gravity does the rest, and down you go, sliding the whole length of it. If you still cherish the notion, while sliding, that the water is moving with you, thrust your arms into it and attempt to paddle; you will find that you have to be remarkably quick to get a stroke, for that water is dropping astern just as fast as you are rushing ahead. ”

“ In all departments of natural science we find ourselves confronted by the phenomena of wave-motion. In the study of earthquakes and tides, telegraphs and telephones, as well as terrestrial temperature, no less than in the examination of water waves and ripples, sound, music, or light and heat, we are bound to consider waves of some particular kind. ”

“ Waves pass across the surface of the sea and successive waves are not the same, nor is what we call the same wave really the same at two different points in its progress, and yet one wave causes another wave and transmits its form and movement. ”

“ This is a conception which is not obvious to common apprehension. It appears paradoxical at first sight to speak of a large wave (as the tide-wave) running up a river at the rate of twenty miles an hour, while the stream of the river is all the while flowing downwards. Yet this is a very common fact. And the conception of such a motion must be fully mastered by all who would reason rightly concerning the mechanical transmission of impressions through a medium. ”

“ You notice at once that waves differ in height. So the waves both of light and sound may differ in height, and to a difference in height corresponds a difference in the intensity of the sound you hear or of the light you see. The higher the wave the greater its energy, the louder is the sound or the brighter is the light. But, in addition to a difference in height, you have noticed that in different waves the distance from crest to crest may vary. The distance from crest to crest is the length of the wave, and waves not only differ in height but also in length. ”

“ Now, the velocity of wave propagation can be seen, without the aid of any mathematical analysis, to depend on the elasticity of the medium and its density; for we can see that if a medium is highly elastic the disturbance would be propagated at a great speed. ”

“ A LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE.
Epes Sargent. Henry Russell.
1. A life on the o - cean wave, A home on the roll - ing
2. Once more on the deck I stand Of my own swift-glid-ing
3. The land is no longer in view, The clouds have be - gun to
deep, Where the scat - tered wa - ters rave, And the ”

“ Alone I walked the ocean strand;
A pearly shell was in my hand:
I stooped, and wrote upon the sand
My name—the year—the day.
As onward from the spot I passed,
One lingering look behind I cast:
A wave came rolling high and fast,
And washed my lines away. ”

“ The waves which spread round a central point when a stone is thrown into the water, give one the idea that the water which forms the wave really moves towards the observer. But it is not so, as may be readily proved by placing on the surface a floating body, which we shall find is but little, if at all, influenced by the undulations of the water. ”

“ Painters have here expended their utmost skill. Whether it is the tiny ripple that dies along the curving sands, or the merry, rustling, crested surf that hurries on to wanton in the rocky pools, or the storm billow that rushes wildly against an iron-bound coast to spurt aloft its sheets of spray or to hurl its threatening mass on the trembling strand—in each and every form the wave is a moving miracle. ”

“ Every breaking wave had its summit illuminated by a light similar to that of phosphorus, and the sides of the vessel, coming in contact with the sea, were strongly marked by a luminous line. Great bodies of light moved in the water along our side, sometimes slower, sometimes quicker ”

“ I know there is no unity and no emotion in the excited sea; each wave is composed of hundreds of thousands of single drops of water, and each drop composed of billions of atoms, and every movement results from mechanical laws under the influence of the pressing water and air. ”

“ So, underneath all waves and eddies of environment, there is a great tidal wave, bearing man steadily onward; and I gain a certain amount of valid knowledge of environment from the direction in which it is bearing me. ”

“ The wind is the rear-guard of the marching files of billows formed as the main wave enters an indentation in the shore. As the wave divides, all the secondary waves pursue the original direction, but the outer ones are retarded, as compared with the middle ones, and seem to fall back. ”

“ Each reflection being thus again and again divided and reflected, we have, following close upon the primary wave, a multitude of secondary waves, which, falling later and later upon the ear, greatly mask the distinctness of the original sound, and give rise to indistinctness and confusion. ”

“ All eyes are fixed upon the object, as trembling and tossing amid the boiling white waves it survives the roughest waters. One breaker past and it will have reached the object of its mission. But being partly filled with water and striking a sunken rock, that next wave sends it hurling to the bottom. ”

“ We can only liken the spectacle that would be presented between the upper and the lower stratum of these winds to the combing of a succession of long waves as they come rolling in from the sea, and breaking one after another, upon the beach. ”

“ Water is fluid, and the upper part of the wave not having been stopped, it keeps on communicating its agitation, and moves on shoreward. Ergo,” says he, “something is bound to be doing when the top of a wave keeps on after the bottom has stopped, dropped out from under. ”

“ If we stand near the seashore and hear the waves dashing against the shingle, we think it is such a great noise, and yet we know that one wave is really composed of millions and millions of minute waves. Each one of these is making a noise, and yet we do not catch it; it is only when they become the big aggregate that we hear. ”

“ If we watch a sea wave rolling in towards the beach, we shall notice that, as it nears the shore, it gets steeper on the shore side, and gradually curls over until it falls and breaks into spray. The reason is because, as the wave gets into the shallow water, the top part of the wave advances more rapidly than the bottom portion. ”

“ A Life on the Ocean Wave.
"A Life on the Ocean Wave," by Epes Sargent (1813-80) , gives the swing and motion of the water of the great ocean. Children remember it almost unconsciously after hearing it read several times. ”