Waterbury evening Democrat., 1888-03-26
CHAPTER V.
I SIGHT A WHITE COAST.


 SIGHT A WHITE COAST.
 Four days did pass in that little open boat.
 The first day was fine till sunset; it then blew fresh from the northwest, and was obliged to keep the boat before the wind. The next day was dark and turbulent, with heavy falls of snow and a high swell from the north, and the wind small gale. On the third day the sun shone, and it was a fair day, but horribly cold and saw two ice bergs, like clouds upon the far western sea line. There followed 8 cruel night of clouded skies, sleet and snow, and a very troubled sea; and then broke the fourth day, as softly brilliant an English May day, but cold great God, how cold
 Thus might epitomize this passage; and I do so to spare you the weariness of rela. tion of uneventful suffering.
 In those four days mainly ran before the wind, and in this way drove many leagues 'uth, though whenever chance offered I hauled my sheet for the east. I know not I am sure, how the boat lived. I might pre- tend it was due to my clever management I do not say had no share in my own pres ervation, but to God belongs all the praise.
 When the third night came down with sullen blasts sweeping into steady stormihg of wind, that swung strong melancholy howl through the gloom, it found me so weak with cold, watching, and anxiety, and the want of space wherein to rid my limbs of the painful cramp which weighted them with an insupportable leaden sensation, that I had barely power to control the boat with the oar. pined for sleep; one hour of slum- Der would, I felt, give me new ife-but durst not close my eyes. The boat was sweeping through the dark and seething seas, and her course had to be that of an arrow, or she would capsize and be smothered in breath.
 Long before daybreak was exhausted. Mercifully, the wind was scant; the stars shone very gloriously; on high sparkled the Cross of the southern world.
 Worn out by three days and nights of suf- fering, I fell into deep sleep, and when awoke my eyes opened right upon the blind ing sun.
 This was the morning of the fourth day. was without watch. By the height of the sun I reckoned the hour to be 10. I threw a languid glance at the compass and found the boats head to be pointing north west.
 I stood up to take view of the horizon, and the first sight that met my eye forced cry from me. Extending the whole length of the southwest seaboard lay what took to be a line of white coast, melting at either extremity into the blue, airy distance. Even at the low elevation of the boat my eye seemed to measure thirty miles of it. It was not white as chalk is; there was some thing of crystalline complexion upon the face of its solidity. It was too far off to en- able me to remark it's outline; yet, on strain ing my sight-the atmosphere being very ex- quisitely clear-I thought could distinguish the projections of peaks, of rounded slopes and aerial angularities in places which, in the refractive lens of the air, looked, with their hue of glassy azure, like the loom of high land behind the coastal line.
 The notion that it was ice came into my head after the first prospect of it; and then returned to my earlier belief that it was land.
 But what lands Some large island that had been missed by the explorers and left uncharteda I put picture of the map of this part of tho world before my minds eye, aud fell to an earnest consideration of it, but could recollect of no land hereabouts- less, indeed, we had been widely wrong in our reckoning aboard the brig, and in the boat had been driven four or five times the dis tance had calculated-things not to be en- l tertained
 put the boats head before the wind, and steered with one hand, while got some break fast with the other. I thanked God for the brightness of the day and for the sight oi that strange white line of land, that went in glimmering blobs of faintness to the trem