THE SEA HAWK 181 
gleaming, writhing, slippery brown. There were 
calm days, too, when the kelp streamed evenly 
this way and that in the current’s tow; there 
were hours so calm, indeed, that the smaller 
seaweeds, red and green, floated, each thread 
apart like long hair combed on a frosty night, 
when dry leaves resting on the rocks were moved 
off one by one. I used to try and detect the 
exact moment when fullest flow was reached, 
that mysterious instant when the highest mussel 
cluster was awash, the dryest limpet just sub- 
merged, when the channel lay filled full as if 
welled up from the depths, when for a moment 
ebb and flow had ceased, and the mighty forces 
of nature balanced one another in wax and 
wane. 
The weather experienced was perhaps excep- 
tionally fine. Our drinking water, caught from 
the roof, had to be carefully saved. In sunshine 
and shade, the sky never fully clouded and never 
cloudless, the time passed but too quickly. 
Thus established on the cliff edge, looking 
across to Te Puka, downwards on the channel 
beneath, the woods of Kotiwhenu behind, full of 
Tuis, Saddlebacks, Robins, and Bellbirds, the 
domestic economy of the Sea Hawk family could 
be registered under particularly pleasant con- 
ditions. 
The preliminary stage in an approach to in- 
