CHAPTER XIII 
"HURSDA Y Morning. — At last a light cold air comes 
off the land on our starboard bow and lifts the edge 
of the mist veil from the smooth leaden-coloured sea, 
leaving a long band of faint yellow. In this we can see 
a line of low hills. ... It is land at last, vague and hazy, 
but still land, and we gaze at it, longing to feel the rocks 
and the earth under foot. . . . 
The mist falls again, and it is almost a relief. The 
land is there all right, and all hands talk and laugh, 
and blow big smokes. There is a time when your feelings 
are too comfortable for expression— that is when you see 
land after three months of sea ; and undoubtedly another 
is the time when you put foot on that land. 
The light air hardened to a fresh breeze, which rippled 
the greenish sea into many white-crested wavelets, and 
made the penguins' black heads go bobbing. 
Now wc have quite a distinct view of the lower parts of 
the land about nine miles to the south of us ; but the mist 
is lying so low on the hills that it is no easy matter to fix 
our exact position, especially as the profile view on the 
Admiralty chart is very small and indistinct. Through a 
lift in the mist we catch a glimpse of a beacon on a low 
rocky point, slightly to the eastward, then the mist falls, 
and we steam ahead, assured of our position. Once more 
the mist rises, and we see Stanley lighthouse on Cape 
164 
