128 The Life Worth Living 



nothing like it in nature. The hollow body 

 of the boat becomes the sounding drum of a 

 great musical instrument, and the Spirit of 

 Winter sweeps its strings with trembling, 

 crystal ringers ! We sit and listen breathless. 

 No master musician ever composed such 

 music and no orchestra could be found to 

 play it. 



The lighthouses, that had been blinking 

 their kindly eyes at us through so many 

 long nights, seemed to have assumed now a 

 strange, glittering stare, and one night, when 

 the storm was at its darkest and wildest 

 pranks, the nearby light was suddenly ob- 

 scured. Great flocks of geese, brant and 

 ducks, lost and crazed by the storm, were 

 dashing themselves in despair to death 

 against the gleaming lens. 



I never cruise in these waters and go home 

 willingly. When the time comes to leave, I 

 feel like a schoolboy driven back to his tasks. 



Swiftly a month rolls away. Days seem 



