178 CONFESSIONS OF A BEACHCOMBER 



The white boat drifted on a blue and lustrous sea. The 

 reef points tapped a monotonous scale as the white sails 

 swang to the swaying of the gaff. Listlessly the boat 

 drifted to the barely perceptible swell, regular as the 

 breathings of a sleeping child. Sound and motion invited 

 to slumber. The shining sea, the islands, green and purple, 

 the soft sweet atmosphere, the full glory of a rare day, kept 

 all the senses in tune. 



There, 4 miles away, lay the island, and close at 

 hand the turtle were ever and anon rising, balloon-like, 

 from coral gardens to gulp greedy draughts of air, which 

 not even the salty essences of the ocean could rob of its 

 perfume. 



Sometimes the boat did seem conscious of inconstancy, 

 and anon with feminine frivolity she would coyly swing 

 round to flirt with the islets close at hand. She would 

 have her own way until the free breezes came, and some- 

 how the wind still blows whereso'er it listeth, and will not 

 be untimely wooed, though the sailor whistles with all the 

 " lascivious pleasing of the lute." 



Some atmospheric phenomenon, altogether beyond idle 

 concern, lifted the islands afar off out of the water, sus- 

 pending them in the sky. The languorous breadths of the 

 sea gradually changed to silver, and under the purple 

 islands the silver band extended, bright and gleaming, until 

 it seemed to merge again into the blue of the sky. That 

 was so, for was it not all visible — the purple islands, with 

 the silver bands separating them from the sea. Yet under 

 ordinary conditions those very islands are blue studs set 

 in the rim of the ocean. What magic is it that uplifts 

 them to-day between the ocean and the sky ? 



This was a day of gushing sunshine and myriads 

 of butterflies. They flew from the mainland, not as 

 spies but in battalions — a never-ending procession miles 

 broad. You could fancy you heard in the throbbing still- 

 ness the movement of the fairy-like wings — a faint, unending 

 hum. From the odorous jungle they came, flitting in gay 

 inconsequence, steering a course of "slanting indeter- 



