A NIGHT AT SEA. 
165 
cumstances of human life, are equally adapted to 
excite contemplation, or to impart more elevated 
conceptions of the Divine Being, and more just 
impressions of the insignificancy and dependence 
of man. In order to avoid the vertical rays of a 
tropical sun, and the painful effects of the reflec¬ 
tion from the water, many of my voyages among 
the Georgian and Society Islands have been made 
during the night. At these periods I have often 
been involuntarily brought under the influence of 
a train of thought and feeling peculiar to the 
season and the situation, but never more power¬ 
fully so than on the present occasion. 
The night was moonless, but not dark. The 
stars increased in number and variety as the even¬ 
ing advanced, until the whole firmament was over¬ 
spread with luminaries of every magnitude and 
brilliancy. The agitation of the sea had subsided, 
and the waters around us appeared to unite with 
the indistinct though visible horizon. In the hea¬ 
ven and the ocean, all powers of vision were lost, 
while the brilliant lights in the one being reflected 
from the surface of the other, gave a correspon¬ 
dence to the appearance of both, and almost forced 
the illusion on the mind, that our little bark was 
suspended in the centre of two united hemi¬ 
spheres. 
The perfect quietude that surrounded us was 
equally impressive. No objects were visible but 
the lamps of heaven, and the luminous appearances 
of the deep. The silence was only broken by the mur¬ 
murs of the breeze passing through our matting sails, 
or the dashing of the spray from the bows of our 
boat, excepting at times, when we heard, or fan¬ 
cied we heard, the blowing of a shoal of porpoises, 
or the more alarming sounds of a spouting whale. 
