The Sky Became
Luminous; The Yellow Chesil Bank, Stretching Long Leagues
Away, And The Hills Behind It, Changed Their Colours To
Violet.
The rough sea near the beach glittered like gold; the
deep green water, flecked with foam, was mingled with fire;
the one boat that remained on it, tossing up and down near the
beach, was like a boat of ebony in a glittering fiery sea.
A
dozen men were drawing up the last net; but when they gathered
round to see what they had taken - mackerel or jelly-fish - I
cared no longer to look with them. That sudden, wonderful
glory which had fallen on the earth and sea had smitten me as
well and changed me; and I was like some needy homeless tramp
who has found a shilling piece, and, even while he is
gloating over it, all at once sees a great treasure before
him - glittering gold in heaps, and all rarest sparkling gems,
more than he can gather up.
But it is a poor simile. No treasures in gold and gems,
though heaped waist-high all about, could produce in the
greediest man, hungry for earthly pleasures, a delight, a
rapture, equal to mine. For this joy was of another and
higher order and very rare, and was a sense of lightness and
freedom from all trammels as if the body had become air,
essence, energy, or soul, and of union with all visible
nature, one with sea and land and the entire vast overarching
sky.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 219 of 298
Words from 59995 to 60246
of 82198
