By Resorting To That Place They Enjoy A Change Of Air, They
Taste The Pleasures Of Exercise; Perhaps An Exhilarating Bowl, Not
At All Improper In This Climate, Affords The Chief Indulgence Known
To These People, On The Days Of Their Greatest Festivity.
The
mounting a horse, must afford a most pleasing exercise to those men
who are so much at sea.
I was once invited to that house, and had
the satisfaction of conducting thither one of the many beauties of
that island (for it abounds with handsome women) dressed in all the
bewitching attire of the most charming simplicity: like the rest of
the company, she was cheerful without loud laughs, and smiling
without affectation. They all appeared gay without levity. I had
never before in my life seen so much unaffected mirth, mixed with so
much modesty. The pleasures of the day were enjoyed with the
greatest liveliness and the most innocent freedom; no disgusting
pruderies, no coquettish airs tarnished this enlivening assembly:
they behaved according to their native dispositions, the only rules
of decorum with which they were acquainted. What would an European
visitor have done here without a fiddle, without a dance, without
cards? He would have called it an insipid assembly, and ranked this
among the dullest days he bad ever spent. This rural excursion had a
very great affinity to those practised in our province, with this
difference only, that we have no objection to the sportive dance,
though conducted by the rough accents of some self-taught African
fiddler. We returned as happy as we went; and the brightness of the
moon kindly lengthened a day which had past, like other agreeable
ones, with singular rapidity.
In order to view the island in its longest direction from the town,
I took a ride to the easternmost parts of it, remarkable only for
the Pochick Rip, where their best fish are caught. I past by the
Tetoukemah lots, which are the fields of the community; the fences
were made of cedar posts and rails, and looked perfectly straight
and neat; the various crops they enclosed were flourishing: thence I
descended into Barrey's Valley, where the blue and the spear grass
looked more abundant than I had seen on any other part of the
island; thence to Gib's Pond; and arrived at last at Siasconcet.
Several dwellings had been erected on this wild shore, for the
purpose of sheltering the fishermen in the season of fishing; I
found them all empty, except that particular one to which I had been
directed. It was like the others, built on the highest part of the
shore, in the face of the great ocean; the soil appeared to be
composed of no other stratum but sand, covered with a thinly
scattered herbage. What rendered this house still more worthy of
notice in my eyes, was, that it had been built on the ruins of one
of the ancient huts, erected by the first settlers, for observing
the appearance of the whales. Here lived a single family without a
neighbour; I had never before seen a spot better calculated to
cherish contemplative ideas; perfectly unconnected with the great
world, and far removed from its perturbations. The ever raging ocean
was all that presented itself to the view of this family; it
irresistibly attracted my whole attention: my eyes were
involuntarily directed to the horizontal line of that watery
surface, which is ever in motion, and ever threatening destruction
to these shores. My ears were stunned with the roar of its waves
rolling one over the other, as if impelled by a superior force to
overwhelm the spot on which I stood. My nostrils involuntarily
inhaled the saline vapours which arose from the dispersed particles
of the foaming billows, or from the weeds scattered on the shores.
My mind suggested a thousand vague reflections, pleasing in the hour
of their spontaneous birth, but now half forgot, and all indistinct:
and who is the landman that can behold without affright so singular
an element, which by its impetuosity seems to be the destroyer of
this poor planet, yet at particular times accumulates the scattered
fragments and produces islands and continents fit for men to dwell
on! Who can observe the regular vicissitudes of its waters without
astonishment; now swelling themselves in order to penetrate through
every river and opening, and thereby facilitate navigation; at other
times retiring from the shores, to permit man to collect that
variety of shell fish which is the support of the poor? Who can see
the storms of wind, blowing sometimes with an impetuosity
sufficiently strong even to move the earth, without feeling himself
affected beyond the sphere of common ideas? Can this wind which but
a few days ago refreshed our American fields, and cooled us in the
shade, be the same element which now and then so powerfully
convulses the waters of the sea, dismasts vessels, causes so many
shipwrecks, and such extensive desolations? How diminutive does a
man appear to himself when filled with these thoughts, and standing
as I did on the verge of the ocean! This family lived entirely by
fishing, for the plough has not dared yet to disturb the parched
surface of the neighbouring plain; and to what purpose could this
operation be performed! Where is it that mankind will not find
safety, peace, and abundance, with freedom and civil happiness?
Nothing was wanting here to make this a most philosophical retreat,
but a few ancient trees, to shelter contemplation in its beloved
solitude. There I saw a numerous family of children of various ages-
-the blessings of an early marriage; they were ruddy as the cherry,
healthy as the fish they lived on, hardy as the pine knots: the
eldest were already able to encounter the boisterous waves, and
shuddered not at their approach; early initiating themselves in the
mysteries of that seafaring career, for which they were all
intended: the younger, timid as yet, on the edge of a less agitated
pool, were teaching themselves with nut-shells and pieces of wood,
in imitation of boats, how to navigate in a future day the larger
vessels of their father, through a rougher and deeper ocean.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 54 of 79
Words from 53941 to 54979
of 79752
