STORMY PETREL. 
147 
do they reck or wot of otie another, nor ever will again in this 
life.—‘The wind passeth over it and it is gone, and the place 
thereof shall know it no more.’ Still the Petrel, who once 
followed in their wake, flits and flies on with untired wing. 
The sudden gust that crossed the path has gone as suddenly 
as it came—all is once more as quiet as it was. Now the 
little bird flickers forwards in the calm stillness of the tropics, 
and under the flaming sun of the south, which seems to have 
as it were, molten the sea itself into a silver mirror, or, as 
you might fancy, of glass, were it not for the rising from it 
every here and there of the flying-fish, and the dash upon it 
of the Testless Sea-mew. One while a perfect calm broods over 
the whole; at another, light baffling winds, gently laden with 
the rich perfume of the land, arise to mock the sailor with hope 
of the ‘haven where he would be,’ hope to be broken again and 
again. Now the sun sets, and the whole western horizon is 
glorious with his departing rays; now he rises, a ball of fire, 
from the east, and runs again his daily course. But, again, 
even the long day of the tropics, wanes on to its end, the 
eventide sky takes new and changing tints, and then the ‘Great 
Light’ of the earth sinks majestically into his gorgeous couch, 
while the whole of the wide expanse glows with soft hues, from 
which the rainbow and the pearl borrow their beauty, and 
gradually all subside into repose, and after heaving in long slug¬ 
gish swells, the ocean is again left to sleep in its cool and 
quiet rest. 
How great the contrast between the unutterable dreariness 
of a northern winter and the blaze of glory of the ‘Sunny South!’ 
But on again from one to the other the bird travels, and now 
as it were driven on the wings of the tempest, the gentle breeze 
of the hot climate turned into the icy hurricane of the north, 
the Stormy Petrel, whose name betokens the habitual current 
of its life, nears the land, and skirts and skims along the iron- 
bound coast. Wild is the scene on many a ‘winter’s evening,’ 
each storm different from every other that has gone before it, 
and yet one and all alike: here are low dense clouds laden with 
the coming gale, and there lurid skies pregnant with tem¬ 
pestuous blasts; to seaward an endless desert of waters; towards 
the land, and brooding over the watery waste, spray, foam, 
and air, mingled as in one, and over all the blackness of 
approaching night. There is a brief lull, as if the tempest were 
taking breath, and girding up its strength for a stronger effort, 
and a frightful stillness prevails for a short space, the sky 
