252 TEE CRUISE OF TEE "CACHALOT:' 



In the calm beauty of the pearly dawn, with a gentle 

 hush over all nature, the lofty, tree-clad hills reflected 

 with startling fidelity in the glassy, many-coloured 

 waters, the only sound audible the occasional cra-a-ake 

 of the advance-guard of a flight of fruit-bats {peca) 

 homeward from their nocturnal depredations, we shipped 

 our oars and started, pulling to a certain position 

 whence we could see over an immense area. Imme- 

 diately upon rounding the horn of our sheltered bay, the 

 fresh breeze of the south-east trades met us riglit on 

 end with a vigour that made a ten-mile steady pull 

 against it somewhat of a breather. Arriving at the 

 station indicated by the chief, we set sail, and, separa- 

 ting as far as possible without losing sight of each other, 

 settled down for the day's steady cruise. Anything 

 more delightful than that excursion to those who love 

 seashore scenery combined with boat-sailing would be 

 difficult to name. Every variety of landscape, every 

 shape of strait, bay, or estuary, reefs awash, reefs over 

 which we could sail, ablaze with loveliness inexpressible ; 

 a steady, gentle, caressing breeze, and overhead one 

 unvarying canopy of deepest blue. Sometimes, when 

 skirting the base of some tremendous cliffs, great caution 

 was necessary, for at one moment there would obtain a 

 calm, death-like in its stillness ; the next, down through 

 a caiion cleaving the mountain to the water's edge 

 would come rushing, with a shrill howl, a blast fierce 

 enough to almost lift us out of the water. Away we 

 would scud with flying sheets dead before it, in a 

 smother of spray, but would hardly get full way on her 

 before it was gone, leaving us in the same hush as before, 

 only a dark patch on the water far to leeward marking 

 its swift rush. These little diversions gave ua no 

 uneasiness, for it was an unknown thing to make a 



