THE DISCOVERY 



21 



plains they gather only by strategy from the 

 surface. The sea knows them not. 



Above all she never knew man — the most un- 

 seaworthy of all the earth-brood. He has fan- 

 cied that she was his enemy, that she wilfully 

 devastated his coasts and destroyed his fleets; 

 but the sea indifferently beats whither it listeth, 

 and if it break the ribs of a ship it shows only 

 how ill adapted was the ship to the sea. What 

 does a cockle shell in such an element? All 

 man's commerce and conquest, all his ventures 

 in civilization, all his philosophy, science, and 

 art have been as nothing unto her. He has 

 sent forth fleets of triremes, carracks, feluccas, 

 galleons, ships of the line; he has founded em- 

 pires by her shores and peopled cities by her 

 bays; but these have made no impression upon 

 her. The destruction of Egypt and Assyria, 

 the fall of Tyre and Sidon, the conquests of 

 Alexander, the vast holocaust of Eome never 

 so much as caused her a quiver. Her waves 

 lapped the blood from the steps of Carthage in 

 the days of Hamilcar and lapped the weed on 

 the same steps when all was silent in decay. 

 Her waters bore the transports of the believing 

 crusaders going to the Holy Land, and they 

 also bore the black fleets of the Barbary cor- 

 sairs on robbery and murder bent. What mat- 



The ten's 

 indifference 

 to man. 



