202 Dry-Fly Fishing. 



suddenly moving as if informed with life, without 

 any visible cause. Facing, and in full view of the 

 broad wake of sounding, rushing, white seething 

 waves left behind by the ship's progress, and 

 perhaps lulled to reverie by the monotonous, dull, 

 rhythmic thuds, one-two-three, oiie-two-three, of the 

 distant engines working the propelling screws 

 beneath where I stood, I gradually lost the sense of 

 being on board ship; say, rather, I was in another 

 world. Overhead the starlit sky was full of mystery. 

 At 3.20 a.m. a heavy dew settled over the deck and 

 everything, and a large solitary bird (not the 

 fateful albatross seen by the Ancient Mariner) 

 hovered near or occasionally swooped down to snatch 

 food from the waves a harbinger of day at hand. 

 The horned, waning moon, at this date in her 

 fourth octant, with Venus in conjunction, were 

 splendid objects in the now lightening wide expanse 

 of heaven, and soon 



The stars from broader beams began to creep, 

 And hide their shining eyelids in the deep. 



And look ! those blushes on the eastern clouds tell 

 that the unrisen sun has lit his beams, and through 

 the soft, grey, misty twilight is about to usher in 

 a glorious day. 



After an uneventful journey we made our port in 

 due course, but at that early hour the town for the 

 most part was still asleep, nor could I get my expected 



