The Disturber ^cy <:> -^^y 



(From The Sands of Pleasure) 



'yHE sea is the great disturber. Nothing 

 human can endure for long unchanged in 

 its presence ; no work of man's hands, or of his 

 thoughts, or even of his character and qualities, 

 but must ultimately go down before its eternal 

 force ; nothing of himself, flesh or spirit, but must 

 thrill and change with the pulses of its unquiet 

 heart. Its vastness is confounding, and towers 

 over us, dwindling us to pin-points of unimport- 

 ance ; beside its movements, calm and punctual, 

 laid out in cycles of the everlasting, the most 

 majestic of our actions seem as petty as the fret- 

 ting trill of an insect's wing ; its storms hush our 

 wars and revolutions ; our deepest silences are 

 audible in its profound calms ; and within its age 

 the twinkling moments of our life pass and dis- 

 appear unheeded into the murk of eternity. 



Filson Young. 



27 



