10 
NATURE NOTES 
before 9 p.m. and all signs of rain vanished. The evening was 
sultry, the air being very oppressive, and the moonless sky was 
somewhat murky, so that the stars only shone faintly and were 
frequently almost obscured. There was a high tide, which at 
flood flowed further up the beach than is usual at the time of 
year ; and the water in the harbour rose to within a few feet 
of the landing stage of the steam-tug pier. 
In the harbour the water was as smooth as glass, and the 
long lanes of coloured light, which were the reflections of the 
harbour lamps, were undisturbed by the slightest quiver or 
wave swell. Around the weed-hung timbers of the piers which 
surround the yacht basin the phosphorescence was scarcely so 
noticeable as it had been on several previous nights ; but from 
the pier-head a grand and impressive sight was to be seen. As 
far as the eye could see out into the dark night, the sea was 
aflame with countless points of brilliant phosphorescence. Every 
ripple that stirred the surface of the water was a streak of cold 
blue fire ; every wavelet that danced to the piping of the rising 
breeze was tipped with the same unearthly light. So faint was 
the starlight that the sea was like a sheet of the blackest satin, 
upon which the phosphorescence gleamed and glowed like 
innumerable marsh-fire’s flickering over some lonesome mere. 
The effect was not merely grand but awe-inspiring. The scene 
seemed too unnatural to be a phenomenon of the home waters, 
and viewing it from the piers one could almost believe one was 
on the deck of some ocean steamer churning its way through a 
tropical sea. The waters between the shore and the sandbanks 
were sprinkled with glorious spangles, which seemed to reflect 
some unseen light as the}' were swept shoreward on the swelling 
tide. The sea was like a witch’s vast cauldron, and the back- 
ground of gloomy sky suggested the dusky setting of some weird 
transformation scene. 
Now and again a boat would put out from between the piers 
and glide away out to sea. The night was too dark for either 
the boat or its occupants to be seen ; but its progress could be 
easily traced by the vivid streams of translucent fire that flowed 
by it on either side. Every dip of the oars caused a sudden 
gleaming like a flash of aqueous lightning, and when they were 
lifted in the air the drops that fell from them sprinkled the water 
with melting discs like evanescent gems. Along the beach the 
blue flame flooded up the shingle with strange serpentine coilings, 
which vanished among the pebbles just as others appeared a 
little distance from the land. Out on the sandbanks there were 
occasional flashes, as though a gathering of .sea sprites, carrying 
will-o’-th’-wisp lanterns, were at play amid the shallows. These 
flashes reminded one of Darwin’s description of a phospho- 
rescent sea through which he sailed in the Beagle, when a little 
south of the Plata. “As far as the eye reached,” he writes, 
“the crest of every wave was bright, and the sky above the 
horizon, from the reflected glare of these living flames, was not 
so utterly obscure as over the vault of the heavens.” 
