216 



r 



Fata Morgana at Gibraltar. 



the w!ioIe be<^an to grow thin and air-like, and four minutes after 

 this the sea before us was perfectly clear. I swept it carefully with 

 tlie spy-glass to find the originals of the inverted ships, but they 

 could not be seen. They must have been so far eastward of us as 



to be below the horizon. 



In the mean time the little promontory of Ceuta, the Spanish 

 coast, and the lower part of the Rock of Gibraltar, had been present- 

 ing a variety of curious shapes. The first of these slopes gently, on 

 both sides from the water ; but now it sometimes presented an iron 

 bound shore, and for a while its eastern side looked much like the 

 open mouth of a shark or crocodile. The real Europa Point could 

 not be seen, but in its place we had its slopes and offsets inverted, 

 and of a sandy or yellowish color. The sandy flats stretching north- 

 eastward from Gibraltar, were elevated into yellow perpendicular 

 walls of o^reat heio-ht: and further still to the eastward, there was 

 apparently an irregular belt of water as smooth and bright as a mir- 

 ror, thouorh the sea all around us was agitated by a four knot breeze. 

 This belt of smooth water was apparently mixed up with the land 

 so as to form lakes and inlets, and here and there on each side their 

 edge w^as dotted with white objects, whose character I could not 

 make out : they were probably houses seen through the lower edge 

 of the focr, and refracted also to the upper line. At one spot one 

 of these white objects extended quite across the crystal belt, widen- 

 ing at each end so as to resemble a water spout. Several fishing 

 boats were sailing along the coast, their fanciful lateen sails glittering 

 bright in the sun. Suddenly the crystal belt stretched by them, and 

 as suddenly we had their images attached in an inverted position to 

 its upper line : this was the prettiest part of the whole exliibition, the 

 spectre boats being as distinct as the originals, and standing out so 

 clearly from the invisible back ground. I had scarcely time, howev- 

 er, to direct the attention of some friends to them, when they began 

 to grow indistinct, and in three minute's time the phantoms could no 

 longer be seen. 



At 12 o'clock 30 minutes, the atmosphere began to clear up on 

 both sides of us, and I was lamenting the loss of such an unusua 

 and splendid exhibition, when, towards one o'clock I found it com- 

 mencing in the straits of Gibraltar, which had heretofore been the 

 only point of our horizon free from it. I noticed, with a watch m 

 my hand, the different changes which the phenomenon underwent 

 in this place, 4nd the followinfr is a coov of notes taken at the time. 



