According to the light-house keeper, the Cape is wasting here on both sides, though most on the eastern. In some places it had lost many rods within the last year, and, erelong, the light-house must be moved. We calculated, from his data, how soon the Cape would be quite worn away at this point, “for,” said he, “I can remember sixty years back.” We were even more surprised at this last announcement,—that is, at the slow waste of life and energy in our informant, for we had taken him to be not more than forty,—than at the rapid wasting of the Cape, and we thought that he stood a fair chance to outlive the former.
Between this October and June of the next year I found that the bank had lost about forty feet in one place, opposite the light-house, and it was cracked more than forty feet farther from the edge at the last date, the shore being strewn with the recent rubbish. But I judged that generally it was not wearing away here at the rate of more than six feet annually19. Any conclusions drawn20 from the observations of a few years or one generation only are likely to prove false, and the Cape may balk21 expectation by its durability22. In some places even a wrecker’s foot-path down the bank lasts several years. One old inhabitant told us that when the light-house was built, in 1798, it was calculated that it would stand forty-five years, allowing the bank to waste one length of fence each year, “but,” said he, “there it is” (or rather another near the same site, about twenty rods from the edge of the bank).
The sea is not gaining on the Cape everywhere, for one man told me of a vessel23 wrecked24 long ago on the north of Provincetown whose “bones” (this was his word) are still visible many rods within the present line of the beach, half buried in sand. Perchance they lie alongside the timbers of a whale. The general statement of the inhabitants is that the Cape is wasting on both sides, but extending itself on particular points on the south and west, as at Chatham and Monomoy Beaches, and at Billingsgate, Long, and Race Points. James Freeman stated in his day that above three miles had been added to Monomoy Beach during the previous fifty years, and it is said to be still extending as fast as ever. A writer in the Massachusetts Magazine, in the last century, tells us that “when the English first settled upon the Cape, there was an island off Chatham, at three leagues’ distance, called Webbs’ Island, containing twenty acres, covered with red-cedar27 or savin. The inhabitants of Nantucket used to carry wood from it”; but he adds that in his day a large rock alone marked the spot, and the water was six fathoms28 deep there. The entrance to Nauset Harbor, which was once in Eastham, has now travelled south into Orleans. The islands in Wellfleet Harbor once formed a continuous beach, though now small vessels29 pass between them. And so of many other parts of this coast.
Perhaps what the Ocean takes from one part of the Cape it gives to another,—robs Peter to pay Paul. On the eastern side the sea appears to be everywhere encroaching on the land. Not only the land is undermined, and its ruins carried off by currents, but the sand is blown from the beach directly up the steep bank where it is one hundred and fifty feet high, and covers the original surface there many feet deep. If you sit on the edge you will have ocular demonstration30 of this by soon getting your eyes full. Thus the bank preserves its height as fast as it is worn away. This sand is steadily31 travelling westward32 at a rapid rate, “more than a hundred yards,” says one writer, within the memory of inhabitants now living; so that in some places peat-meadows are buried deep under the sand, and the peat is cut through it; and in one place a large peat-meadow has made its appearance on the shore in the bank covered many feet deep, and peat has been cut there. This accounts for that great pebble33 of peat which we saw in the surf. The old oysterman had told us that many years ago he lost a “crittur” by her being mired35 in a swamp near the Atlantic side east of his house, and twenty years ago he lost the swamp itself entirely36, but has since seen signs of it appearing on the beach. He also said that he had seen cedar stumps37 “as big as cart-wheels”(!) on the bottom of the Bay, three miles off Billingsate Point, when leaning over the side of his boat in pleasant weather, and that that was dry land not long ago. Another told us that a log canoe known to have been buried many years before on the Bay side at East Harbor in Truro, where the Cape is extremely narrow, appeared at length on the Atlantic side, the Cape having rolled over it, and an old woman said,—“Now, you see, it is true what I told you, that the Cape is moving.”
The bars along the coast shift with every storm, and in many places there is occasionally none at all. We ourselves observed the effect of a single storm with a high tide in the night, in July, 1855. It moved the sand on the beach opposite the light-house to the depth of six feet, and three rods in width as far as we could see north and south, and carried it bodily off no one knows exactly where, laying bare in one place a large rock five feet high which was invisible before, and narrowing the beach to that extent. There is usually, as I have said, no bathing on the back-side of the Cape, on account of the undertow, but when we were there last, the sea had, three months before, cast up a bar near this lighthouse, two miles long and ten rods wide, over which the tide did not flow, leaving a narrow cove26, then a quarter of a mile long, between it and the shore, which afforded excellent bathing. This cove had from time to time been closed up as the bar travelled northward39, in one instance imprisoning40 four or five hundred whiting and cod, which died there, and the water as often turned fresh, and finally gave place to sand. This bar, the inhabitants assured us, might be wholly removed, and the water six feet deep there in two or three days.
The light-house keeper said that when the wind blowed strong on to the shore, the waves ate fast into the bank, but when it blowed off they took no sand away; for in the former case the wind heaped up the surface of the water next to the beach, and to preserve its equilibrium41 a strong undertow immediately set back again into the sea which carried with it the sand and whatever else was in the way, and left the beach hard to walk on; but in the latter case the undertow set on and carried the sand with it, so that it was particularly difficult for shipwrecked men to get to land when the wind blowed on to the shore, but easier when it blowed off. This undertow, meeting the next surface wave on the bar which itself has made, forms part of the dam over which the latter breaks, as over an upright wall. The sea thus plays with the land holding a sand-bar in its mouth awhile before it swallows it, as a cat plays with a mouse; but the fatal gripe is sure to come at last. The sea sends its rapacious43 east wind to rob the land, but before the former has got far with its prey44, the land sends its honest west wind to recover some of its own. But, according to Lieutenant45 Davis, the forms, extent, and distribution of sand-bars and banks are principally determined46, not by winds and waves but by tides.
Our host said that you would be surprised if you were on the beach when the wind blew a hurricane directly on to it, to see that none of the drift-wood came ashore47, but all was carried directly northward and parallel with the shore as fast as a man can walk, by the inshore current, which sets strongly in that direction at flood tide. The strongest swimmers also are carried along with it, and never gain an inch toward the beach. Even a large rock has been moved half a mile northward along-the beach. He assured us that the sea was never still on the back-side of the Cape, but ran commonly as high as your head, so that a great part of the time you could not launch a boat there, and even in the calmest weather the waves run six or eight feet up the beach, though then you could get off on a plank48. Champlain and Pourtrincourt could not land here in 1606, on account of the swell49 (la houlle), yet the savages50 came off to them in a canoe. In the Sieur de la Borde’s “Relation des Caraibes,” my edition of which was published at Amsterdam in 1711, at page 530 he says:—
“Couroumon a Caraibe, also a star [i.e. a god], makes the great lames51 à la mer, and overturns canoes. Lames à la mer are the long vagues which are not broken (entrecoupées), and such as one sees come to land all in one piece, from one end of a beach to another, so that, however little wind there may be, a shallop or a canoe could hardly land (aborder terre) without turning over, or being filled with water.”
But on the Bay side the water even at its edge is often as smooth and still as in a pond. Commonly there are no boats used along this beach. There was a boat belonging to the Highland Light which the next keeper after he had been there a year had not launched, though he said that there was good fishing just off the shore. Generally the Life Boats cannot be used when needed. When the waves run very high it is impossible to get a boat off, however skilfully52 you steer53 it, for it will often be completely covered by the curving edge of the approaching breaker as by an arch, and so filled with water, or it will be lifted up by its bows, turned directly over backwards54, and all the contents spilled out. A spar thirty feet long is served in the same way.
I heard of a party who went off fishing back of Wellfleet some years ago, in two boats, in calm weather, who, when they had laden55 their boats with fish, and approached the land again, found such a swell breaking on it, though there was no wind, that they were afraid to enter it. At first they thought to pull for Provincetown, but night was coming on, and that was many miles distant. Their case seemed a desperate one. As often as they approached the shore and saw the terrible breakers that intervened, they were deterred56. In short, they were thoroughly57 frightened. Finally, having thrown their fish overboard, those in one boat chose a favorable opportunity, and succeeded, by skill and good luck, in reaching the land, but they were unwilling58 to take the responsibility of telling the others when to come in, and as the other helmsman was inexperienced, their boat was swamped at once, yet all managed to save themselves.
Much smaller waves soon make a boat “nail-sick,” as the phrase is. The keeper said that after a long and strong blow there would be three large waves, each successively larger than the last, and then no large ones for some time, and that, when they wished to land in a boat, they came in on the last and largest wave. Sir Thomas Browne (as quoted in Brand’s Popular Antiquities59, p. 372), on the subject of the tenth wave being “greater or more dangerous than any other,” after quoting Ovid,—
“Qui venit hic fluctus, fluctus supereminet omnes
Posterior nono est, undecimo que prior,”—
says, “Which, notwithstanding, is evidently false; nor can it be made out either by observation either upon the shore or the ocean, as we have with diligence explored in both. And surely in vain we expect regularity61 in the waves of the sea, or in the particular motions thereof, as we may in its general reciprocations, whose causes are constant, and effects therefore correspondent; whereas its fluctuations62 are but motions subservient63, which winds, storms, shores, shelves, and every interjacency, irregulates.”
We read that the Clay Pounds, were so called “because vessels have had the misfortune to be pounded against it in gales64 of wind,” which we regard as a doubtful derivation. There are small ponds here, upheld by the clay, which were formerly66 called the Clay Pits. Perhaps this, or Clay Ponds, is the origin of the name. Water is found in the clay quite near the surface; but we heard of one man who had sunk a well in the sand close by, “till he could see stars at noonday,” without finding any. Over this bare Highland the wind has full sweep. Even in July it blows the wings over the heads of the young turkeys, which do not know enough to head against it; and in gales the doors and windows are blown in, and you must hold on to the lighthouse to prevent being blown into the Atlantic. They who merely keep out on the beach in a storm in the winter are sometimes rewarded by the Humane67 Society. If you would feel the full force of a tempest, take up your residence on the top of Mount Washington, or at the Highland Light, in Truro.
It was said in 1794 that more vessels were cast away on the east shore of Truro than anywhere in Barnstable County. Notwithstanding that this light-house has since been erected69, after almost every storm we read of one or more vessels wrecked here, and sometimes more than a dozen wrecks70 are visible from this point at one time. The inhabitants hear the crash of vessels going to pieces as they sit round their hearths71, and they commonly date from some memorable72 shipwreck42. If the history of this beach could be written from beginning to end, it would be a thrilling page in the history of commerce.
Truro was settled in the year 1700 as Dangerfield. This was a very appropriate name, for I afterward73 read on a monument in the graveyard74, near Pamet River, the following inscription:—
Sacred
to the memory of
57 citizens of Truro,
who were lost in seven
vessels, which
of Oct. 3d, 1841.
Their names and ages by families were recorded on different sides of the stone. They are said to have been lost on George’s Bank, and I was told that only one vessel drifted ashore on the backside of the Cape, with the boys locked into the cabin and drowned. It is said that the homes of all were “within a circuit of two miles.” Twenty-eight inhabitants of Dennis were lost in the same gale; and I read that “in one day, immediately after this storm, nearly or quite one hundred bodies were taken up and buried on Cape Cod.” The Truro Insurance Company failed for want of skippers to take charge of its vessels. But the surviving inhabitants went a-fishing again the next year as usual. I found that it would not do to speak of shipwrecks76 there, for almost every family has lost some of its members at sea. “Who lives in that house?” I inquired. “Three widows,” was the reply. The stranger and the inhabitant view the shore with very different eyes. The former may have come to see and admire the ocean in a storm; but the latter looks on it as the scene where his nearest relatives were wrecked. When I remarked to an old wrecker partially77 blind, who was sitting on the edge of the bank smoking a pipe, which he had just lit with a match of dried beach-grass, that I supposed he liked to hear the sound of the surf, he answered: “No, I do not like to hear the sound of the surf.” He had lost at least one son in “the memorable gale,” and could tell many a tale of the shipwrecks which he had witnessed there.
In the year 1717, a noted78 pirate named Bellamy was led on to the bar off Wellfleet by the captain of a snow which he had taken, to whom he had offered his vessel again if he would pilot him into Provincetown Harbor. Tradition says that the latter threw over a burning tar-barrel in the night, which drifted ashore, and the pirates followed it. A storm coming on, their whole fleet was wrecked, and more than a hundred dead bodies lay along the shore. Six who escaped shipwreck were executed. “At times to this day” (1793), says the historian of Wellfleet, “there are King William and Queen Mary’s coppers79 picked up, and pieces of silver called cob-money. The violence of the seas moves the sands on the outer bar, so that at times the iron caboose of the ship [that is, Bellamy’s] at low ebbs25 has been seen.” Another tells us that, “For many years after this shipwreck, a man of a very singular and frightful80 aspect used every spring and autumn to be seen travelling on the Cape, who was supposed to have been one of Bellamy’s crew. The presumption81 is that he went to some place where money had been secreted82 by the pirates, to get such a supply as his exigencies83 required. When he died, many pieces of gold were found in a girdle which he constantly wore.”
As I was walking on the beach here in my last visit, looking for shells and pebbles84, just after that storm, which I have mentioned as moving the sand to a great depth, not knowing but I might find some cob-money, I did actually pick up a French crown piece, worth about a dollar and six cents, near high-water mark, on the still moist sand, just under the abrupt85, caving base of the bank. It was of a dark slate86 color, and looked like a flat pebble, but still bore a very distinct and handsome head of Louis XV., and the usual legend on the reverse. Sit Nomen Domini Benedictum (Blessed be the Name of the Lord), a pleasing sentiment to read in the sands of the sea-shore, whatever it might be stamped on, and I also made out the date, 1741. Of course, I thought at first that it was that same old button which I have found so many times, but my knife soon showed the silver. Afterward, rambling87 on the bars at low tide, I cheated my companion by holding up round shells (Scutellæ) between my fingers, whereupon he quickly stripped and came off to me.
In the Revolution, a British ship of war called the Somerset was wrecked near the Clay Pounds, and all on board, some hundreds in number, were taken prisoners. My informant said that he had never seen any mention of this in the histories, but that at any rate he knew of a silver watch, which one of those prisoners by accident left there, which was still going to tell the story. But this event is noticed by some writers.
The next summer I saw a sloop88 from Chatham dragging for anchors and chains just oft’ this shore. She had her boats out at the work while she shuffled89 about on various tacks90, and, when anything was found, drew up to hoist91 it on board. It is a singular employment, at which men are regularly hired and paid for their industry, to hunt to-day in pleasant weather for anchors which have been lost,—the sunken faith and hope of mariners, to which they trusted in vain; now, perchance, it is the rusty92 one of some old pirate’s ship or Norman fisherman, whose cable parted here two hundred years ago; and now the best bower93 anchor of a Canton or a California ship, which has gone about her business. If the roadsteads of the spiritual ocean could be thus dragged, what rusty flukes of hope deceived and parted chain-cables of faith might again be windlassed aboard! enough to sink the finder’s craft, or stock new navies to the end of time. The bottom of the sea is strewn with anchors, some deeper and some shallower, and alternately covered and uncovered by the sand, perchance with a small length of iron cable still attached,—to which where is the other end? So many unconcluded tales to be continued another time. So, if we had diving-bells adapted to the spiritual deeps, we should see anchors with their cables attached, as thick as eels38 in vinegar, all wriggling94 vainly toward their holding-ground. But that is not treasure for us which another man has lost; rather it is for us to seek what no other man has found or can find,—not be Chatham men, dragging for anchors.
The annals of this voracious95 beach! who could write them, unless it were a shipwrecked sailor? How many who have seen it have seen it only in the midst of danger and distress96, the last strip of earth which their mortal eyes beheld97. Think of the amount of suffering which a single strand98 has witnessed. The ancients would have represented it as a sea-monster with open jaws99, more terrible than Scylla and Charybdis. An inhabitant of Truro told me that about a fortnight after the St. John was wrecked at Cohasset he found two bodies on the shore at the Clay Pounds. They were those of a man, and a corpulent woman. The man had thick boots on, though his head was off, but “it was alongside.” It took the finder some weeks to get over the sight. Perhaps they were man and wife, and whom God had joined the ocean currents had not put asunder100. Yet by what slight accidents at first may they have been associated in their drifting. Some of the bodies of those passengers were picked up far out at sea, boxed up and sunk; some brought ashore and buried. There are more consequences to a shipwreck than the underwriters notice. The Gulf101 Stream may return some to their native shores, or drop them in some out-of-the-way cave of Ocean, where time and the elements will write new riddles102 with their bones.—But to return to land again.
In this bank, above the clay, I counted in the summer, two hundred holes of the Bank Swallow within a space six rods long, and there were at least one thousand old birds within three times that distance, twittering over the surf. I had never associated them in my thoughts with the beach before. One little boy who had been a-birds-nesting had got eighty swallows’ eggs for his share! Tell it not to the Humane Society. There were many young birds on the clay beneath, which had tumbled out and died. Also there were many Crow-blackbirds hopping103 about in the dry fields, and the Upland Plover104 were breeding close by the light-house. The keeper had once cut off one’s wing while mowing105, as she sat on her eggs there. This is also a favorite resort for gunners in the fall to shoot the Golden Plover. As around the shores of a pond are seen devil’s-needles, butterflies, etc., so here, to my surprise, I saw at the same season great devil’s-needles of a size proportionably larger, or nearly as big as my finger, incessantly106 coasting up and down the edge of the bank, and butterflies also were hovering107 over it, and I never saw so many dorr-bugs and beetles108 of various kinds as strewed109 the beach. They had apparently110 flown over the bank in the night, and could not get up again, and some had perhaps fallen into the sea and were washed ashore. They may have been in part attracted by the light-house lamps.
The Clay Pounds are a more fertile tract111 than usual. We saw some fine patches of roots and corn here. As generally on the Cape, the plants had little stalk or leaf, but ran remarkably112 to seed. The corn was hardly more than half as high as in the interior, yet the ears were large and full, and one farmer told us that he could raise forty bushels on an acre without manure113, and sixty with it. The heads of the rye also were remarkably large. The Shadbush (Amelanchier), Beach Plums, and Blueberries (Vaccinium Pennsylvanicum), like the apple-trees and oaks, were very dwarfish114, spreading over the sand, but at the same time very fruitful. The blueberry was but an inch or two high, and its fruit often rested on the ground, so that you did not suspect the presence of the bushes, even on those bare hills, until you were treading on them. I thought that this fertility must be owing mainly to the abundance of moisture in the atmosphere, for I observed that what little grass there was was remarkably laden with dew in the morning, and in summer dense115 imprisoning fogs frequently last till midday, turning one’s beard into a wet napkin about his throat, and the oldest inhabitant may lose his way within a stone’s throw of his house or be obliged to follow the beach for a guide. The brick house attached to the light-house was exceedingly damp at that season, and, writing-paper lost all its stiffness in it. It was impossible to dry your towel after bathing, or to press flowers without their mildewing116. The air was so moist that we rarely wished to drink, though we could at all times taste the salt on our lips. Salt was rarely used at table, and our host told us that his cattle invariably refused it when it was offered them, they got so much with their grass and at every breath, but he said that a sick horse or one just from the country would sometimes take a hearty117 draught118 of salt water, and seemed to like it and be the better for it.
It was surprising to see how much water was contained in the terminal bud of the sea-side golden-rod, standing60 in the sand early in July, and also how turnips119, beets120, carrots, etc., flourished even in pure sand. A man travelling by the shore near there not long before us noticed something green growing in the pure sand of the beach, just at high-water mark, and on approaching found it to be a bed of beets flourishing vigorously, probably from seed washed out of the Franklin. Also beets and turnips came up in the sea-weed used for manure in many parts of the Cape. This suggests how various plants may have been dispersed121 over the world to distant islands and continents. Vessels, with seeds in their cargoes122, destined123 for particular ports, where perhaps they were not needed, have been cast away on desolate124 islands, and though their crews perished, some of their seeds have been preserved. Out of many kinds a few would find a soil and climate adapted to them, become naturalized, and perhaps drive out the native plants at last, and so fit the land for the habitation of man. It is an ill wind that blows nobody any good, and for the time lamentable125 shipwrecks may thus contribute a new vegetable to a continent’s stock, and prove on the whole a lasting126 blessing127 to its inhabitants. Or winds and currents might effect the same without the intervention128 of man. What indeed are the various succulent plants which grow on the beach but such beds of beets and turnips, sprung originally from seeds which perhaps were cast on the waters for this end, though we do not know the Franklin which they came out of? In ancient times some Mr. Bell (?) was sailing this way in his ark with seeds of rocket, salt-wort, sandwort, beachgrass, samphire, bayberry, poverty-grass, etc., all nicely labelled with directions, intending to establish a nursery somewhere; and did not a nursery get established, though he thought that he had failed?
About the light-house I observed in the summer the pretty Polygala polygama, spreading ray-wise flat on the ground, white pasture thistles (Cirsium pumilum), and amid the shrubbery the Smilax glauca, which is commonly said not to grow so far north; near the edge of the banks about half a mile southward, the broom crow-berry (Empetrum Conradii), for which Plymouth is the only locality in Massachusetts usually named, forms pretty green mounds129 four or five feet in diameter by one foot high,—soft, springy beds for the wayfarer130. I saw it afterward in Provincetown, but prettiest of all the scarlet131 pimpernel, or poor-man’s weather-glass (Anagallis-arvensis), greets you in fair weather on almost every square yard of sand. From Yarmouth, I have received the Chrysopsis falcata (golden aster), and Vaccinium stamineum (Deerberry or Squaw Huckleberry), with fruit not edible132, sometimes as large as a cranberry133 (Sept. 7).
The Highland Light-house,[1] where we were staying, is a substantial-looking building of brick, painted white, and surmounted134 by an iron cap. Attached to it is the dwelling135 of the keeper, one story high, also of brick, and built by government. As we were going to spend the night in a light-house, we wished to make the most of so novel an experience, and therefore told our host that we would like to accompany him when he went to light up. At rather early candle-light he lighted a small Japan lamp, allowing it to smoke rather more than we like on ordinary occasions, and told us to follow him. He led the way first through his bedroom, which was placed nearest to the light-house, and then through a long, narrow, covered passage-way, between whitewashed136 walls like a prison entry, into the lower part of the light-house, where many great butts137 of oil were arranged around; thence we ascended138 by a winding139 and open iron stairway, with a steadily increasing scent140 of oil and lamp-smoke, to a trap-door in an iron floor, and through this into the lantern. It was a neat building, with everything in apple-pie order, and no danger of anything; rusting141 there for want of oil. The light consisted of fifteen argand lamps, placed within smooth concave reflectors twenty-one inches in diameter, and arranged in two horizontal circles one above the other, facing every way excepting directly down the Cape. These were surrounded, at a distance of two or three feet, by large plate-glass windows, which defied the storms, with iron sashes, on which rested the iron cap. All the iron work, except the floor, was painted white. And thus the light-house was completed. We walked slowly round in that narrow space as the keeper lighted each lamp in succession, conversing142 with him at the same moment that many a sailor on the deep witnessed the lighting143 of the Highland Light. His duty was to fill and trim and light his lamps, and keep bright the reflectors. He filled them every morning, and trimmed them commonly once in the course of the night. He complained of the quality of the oil which was furnished. This house consumes about eight hundred gallons in a year, which cost not far from one dollar a gallon; but perhaps a few lives would be saved if better oil were provided. Another light-house keeper said that the same proportion of winter-strained oil was sent to the southernmost light-house in the union as to the most northern. Formerly, when this light-house had windows with small and thin panes144, a severe storm would sometimes break the glass, and then they were obliged to put up a wooden shutter145 in haste to save their lights and reflectors,—and sometimes in tempests, when the mariner2 stood most in need of their guidance, they had thus nearly converted the light-house into a dark lantern, which emitted only a few feeble rays, and those commonly on the land or lee side. He spoke146 of the anxiety and sense of responsibility which he felt in cold and stormy nights in the winter; when he knew that many a poor fellow was depending on him, and his lamps burned dimly, the oil being chilled. Sometimes he was obliged to warm the oil in a kettle in his house at midnight, and fill his lamps over again,—for he could not have a fire in the light-house, it produced such a sweat on the windows. His successor told me that he could not keep too hot a fire in such a case. All this because the oil was poor. The government lighting the mariners on its wintry coast with summer-strained oil, to save expense! That were surely a summer-strained mercy.
This keeper’s successor, who kindly147 entertained me the next year stated that one extremely cold night, when this and all the neighboring lights were burning summer oil, but he had been provident148 enough to reserve a little winter oil against emergencies, he was waked up with anxiety, and found that his oil was congealed149, and his lights almost extinguished; and when, after many hours’ exertion150, he had succeeded in replenishing his reservoirs with winter oil at the wick end, and with difficulty had made them burn, he looked out and found that the other lights in the neighborhood, which were usually visible to him, had gone out, and he heard afterward that the Pamet River and Billingsgate Lights also had been extinguished.
Our host said that the frost, too, on the windows caused him much trouble, and in sultry summer nights the moths151 covered them and dimmed his lights; sometimes even small birds flew against the thick plate glass, and were found on the ground beneath in the morning with their necks broken. In the spring of 1855 he found nineteen small yellow-birds, perhaps goldfinches or myrtle-birds, thus lying dead around the light-house; and sometimes in the fall he had seen where a golden plover had struck the glass in the night, and left the down and the fatty part of its breast on it.
Thus he struggled, by every method, to keep his light shining before men. Surely the light-house keeper has a responsible, if an easy, office. When his lamp goes out, he goes out; or, at most, only one such accident is pardoned.
I thought it a pity that some poor student did not live there, to profit by all that light, since he would not rob the mariner. “Well,” he said, “I do sometimes come up here and read the newspaper when they are noisy down below.” Think of fifteen argand lamps to read the newspaper by! Government oil!—light, enough, perchance, to read the Constitution by! I thought that he should read nothing less than his Bible by that light. I had a classmate who fitted for college by the lamps of a light-house, which was more light, we think, than the University afforded.
When we had come down and walked a dozen rods from the light-house, we found that we could not get the full strength of its light on the narrow strip of land between it and the shore, being too low for the focus, and we saw only so many feeble and rayless stars; but at forty rods inland we could see to read, though we were still indebted to only one lamp. Each reflector sent forth152 a separate “fan” of light,—one shone on the windmill, and one in the hollow, while the intervening spaces were in shadow. This light is said to be visible twenty nautical153 miles and more from an observer fifteen feet above the level of the sea. We could see the revolving154 light at Race Point, the end of the Cape, about nine miles distant, and also the light on Long Point, at the entrance of Provincetown Harbor, and one of the distant Plymouth Harbor Lights, across the Bay, nearly in a range with the last, like a star in the horizon. The keeper thought that the other Plymouth Light was concealed155 by being exactly in a range with the Long Point Light. He told us that the mariner was sometimes led astray by a mackerel fisher’s lantern, who was afraid of being run down in the night, or even by a cottager’s light, mistaking them for some well-known light on the coast, and, when he discovered his mistake, was wont156 to curse the prudent157 fisher or the wakeful cottager without reason.
Though it was once declared that Providence158 placed this mass of clay here on purpose to erect68 a light-house on, the keeper said that the light-house should have been erected half a mile farther south, where the coast begins to bend, and where the light could be seen at the same time with the Nauset Lights, and distinguished159 from them. They now talk of building one there. It happens that the present one is the more useless now, so near the extremity of the Cape, because other light-houses have since been erected there.
Among the many regulations of the Light-house Board, hanging against the wall here, many of them excellent, perhaps, if there were a regiment160 stationed here to attend to them, there is one requiring the keeper to keep an account of the number of vessels which pass his light during the day. But there are a hundred vessels in sight at once, steering161 in all directions, many on the very verge162 of the horizon, and he must have more eyes than Argus, and be a good deal farther-sighted, to tell which are passing his light. It is an employment in some respects best suited to the habits of the gulls163 which coast up and down here, and circle over the sea.
I was told by the next keeper, that on the 8th of June following, a particularly clear and beautiful morning, he rose about half an hour before sunrise, and having a little time to spare, for his custom was to extinguish his lights at sunrise, walked down toward the shore to see what he might find. When he got to the edge of the bank he looked up, and, to his astonishment164, saw the sun rising, and already part way above the horizon. Thinking that his clock was wrong, he made haste back, and though it was still too early by the clock, extinguished his lamps, and when he had got through and come down, he looked out the window, and, to his still greater astonishment, saw the sun just where it was before, two-thirds above the horizon. He showed me where its rays fell on the wall across the room. He proceeded to make a fire, and when he had done, there was the sun still at the same height. Whereupon, not trusting to his own eyes any longer, he called up his wife to look at it, and she saw it also. There were vessels in sight on the ocean, and their crews, too, he said, must have seen it, for its rays fell on them. It remained at that height for about fifteen minutes by the clock, and then rose as usual, and nothing else extraordinary happened during that day. Though accustomed to the coast, he had never witnessed nor heard of such a phenomenon before. I suggested that there might have been a cloud in the horizon invisible to him, which rose with the sun, and his clock was only as accurate as the average; or perhaps, as he denied the possibility of this, it was such a looming165 of the sun as is said to occur at Lake Superior and elsewhere. Sir John Franklin, for instance, says in his Narrative166, that when he was on the shore of the Polar Sea, the horizontal refraction varied167 so much one morning that “the upper limb of the sun twice appeared at the horizon before it finally rose.”
He certainly must be a son of Aurora168 to whom the sun looms169, when there are so many millions to whom it glooms rather, or who never see it till an hour after it has risen. But it behooves170 us old stagers to keep our lamps trimmed and burning to the last, and not trust to the sun’s looming.
This keeper remarked that the centre of the flame should be exactly opposite the centre of the reflectors, and that accordingly, if he was not careful to turn down his wicks in the morning, the sun falling on the reflectors on the south side of the building would set fire to them, like a burning-glass, in the coldest day, and he would look up at noon and see them all lighted! When your light is ready to give light, it is readiest to receive it, and the sun will light it. His successor said that he had never known them to blaze in such a case, but merely to smoke.
I saw that this was a place of wonders. In a sea turn or shallow fog while I was there the next summer, it being clear overhead, the edge of the bank twenty rods distant, appeared like a mountain pasture in the horizon. I was completely deceived by it, and I could then understand why mariners sometimes ran ashore in such cases, especially in the night, supposing it to be far away, though they could see the land. Once since this, being in a large oyster34 boat two or three hundred miles from here, in a dark night, when there was a thin veil of mist on land and water, we came so near to running on to the land before our skipper was aware of it, that the first warning was my hearing the sound of the surf under my elbow. I could almost have jumped ashore, and we were obliged to go about very suddenly to prevent striking. The distant light for which we were steering, supposing it a light-house five or six miles off, came through the cracks of a fisherman’s bunk171 not more than six rods distant.
The keeper entertained us handsomely in his solitary172 little ocean house. He was a man of singular patience and intelligence, who, when our queries173 struck him, rung as clear as a bell in response. The light-house lamps a few feet distant shone full into my chamber174, and made it as bright as day, so I knew exactly how the Highland Light bore all that night, and I was in no danger of being wrecked. Unlike the last, this was as still as a summer night. I thought, as I lay there, half awake and half asleep, looking upward through the window at the lights above my head, how many sleepless175 eyes from far out on the Ocean stream—mariners of all nations spinning their yarns176 through the various watches of the night—were directed toward my couch.
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1
mariners
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| 海员，水手（mariner的复数形式） | |
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mariner
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| n.水手号不载人航天探测器，海员，航海者 | |
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cape
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| n.海角，岬；披肩，短披风 | |
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cod
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| n.鳕鱼；v.愚弄；哄骗 | |
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highland
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| n.(pl.)高地，山地 | |
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shingling
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| 压挤熟铁块，叠瓦作用 | |
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shingles
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| n.带状疱疹；（布满海边的）小圆石( shingle的名词复数 )；屋顶板；木瓦（板）；墙面板 | |
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shingle
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| n.木瓦板；小招牌(尤指医生或律师挂的营业招牌)；v.用木瓦板盖（屋顶）；把（女子头发）剪短 | |
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contrived
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| adj.不自然的，做作的；虚构的 | |
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pivots
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| n.枢( pivot的名词复数 )；最重要的人（或事物）；中心；核心v.（似）在枢轴上转动( pivot的第三人称单数 )；把…放在枢轴上；以…为核心，围绕（主旨）展开 | |
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elevation
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| n.高度；海拔；高地；上升；提高 | |
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immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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extremity
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| n.末端，尽头；尽力；终极；极度 | |
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trickling
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| n.油画底色含油太多而成泡沫状突起v.滴( trickle的现在分词 )；淌；使)慢慢走；缓慢移动 | |
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intervals
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| n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 )；间隔时间；[数学]区间；（戏剧、电影或音乐会的）幕间休息 | |
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ridges
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| n.脊( ridge的名词复数 )；山脊；脊状突起；大气层的)高压脊 | |
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curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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crater
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| n.火山口，弹坑 | |
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annually
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| adv.一年一次，每年 | |
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drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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balk
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| n.大方木料；v.妨碍；不愿前进或从事某事 | |
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durability
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| n.经久性，耐用性 | |
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vessel
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| n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管 | |
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wrecked
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| adj.失事的，遇难的 | |
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ebbs
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| 退潮( ebb的名词复数 )； 落潮； 衰退 | |
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cove
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| n.小海湾，小峡谷 | |
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cedar
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| n.雪松，香柏(木) | |
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fathoms
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| 英寻( fathom的名词复数 ) | |
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vessels
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| n.血管( vessel的名词复数 )；船；容器；（具有特殊品质或接受特殊品质的）人 | |
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demonstration
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| n.表明，示范，论证，示威 | |
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steadily
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| adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地 | |
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westward
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| n.西方，西部；adj.西方的，向西的；adv.向西 | |
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pebble
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| n.卵石，小圆石 | |
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oyster
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| n.牡蛎；沉默寡言的人 | |
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mired
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| abbr.microreciprocal degree 迈尔德（色温单位）v.深陷( mire的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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stumps
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| （被砍下的树的）树桩( stump的名词复数 )； 残肢； （板球三柱门的）柱； 残余部分 | |
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eels
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| abbr. 电子发射器定位系统（=electronic emitter location system） | |
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northward
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| adv.向北；n.北方的地区 | |
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imprisoning
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| v.下狱，监禁( imprison的现在分词 ) | |
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41
equilibrium
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| n.平衡，均衡，相称，均势，平静 | |
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42
shipwreck
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| n.船舶失事，海难 | |
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43
rapacious
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| adj.贪婪的，强夺的 | |
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44
prey
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| n.被掠食者，牺牲者，掠食；v.捕食，掠夺，折磨 | |
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45
lieutenant
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| n.陆军中尉，海军上尉；代理官员，副职官员 | |
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46
determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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47
ashore
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| adv.在(向)岸上，上岸 | |
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48
plank
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| n.板条，木板，政策要点，政纲条目 | |
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49
swell
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| vi.膨胀，肿胀；增长，增强 | |
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50
savages
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| 未开化的人，野蛮人( savage的名词复数 ) | |
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51
lames
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| 瘸的( lame的第三人称单数 )； 站不住脚的； 差劲的； 蹩脚的 | |
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52
skilfully
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| adv. (美skillfully)熟练地 | |
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53
steer
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| vt.驾驶，为…操舵；引导；vi.驾驶 | |
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54
backwards
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| adv.往回地，向原处，倒，相反，前后倒置地 | |
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55
laden
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| adj.装满了的；充满了的；负了重担的；苦恼的 | |
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56
deterred
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| v.阻止，制止( deter的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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58
unwilling
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| adj.不情愿的 | |
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antiquities
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| n.古老( antiquity的名词复数 )；古迹；古人们；古代的风俗习惯 | |
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60
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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61
regularity
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| n.规律性，规则性；匀称，整齐 | |
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fluctuations
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| 波动，涨落，起伏( fluctuation的名词复数 ) | |
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subservient
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| adj.卑屈的，阿谀的 | |
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gales
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| 龙猫 | |
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gale
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| n.大风，强风，一阵闹声（尤指笑声等） | |
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formerly
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| adv.从前，以前 | |
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humane
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| adj.人道的，富有同情心的 | |
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erect
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| n./v.树立，建立，使竖立；adj.直立的，垂直的 | |
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69
ERECTED
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| adj. 直立的，竖立的，笔直的 vt. 使 ... 直立，建立 | |
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wrecks
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| n.沉船( wreck的名词复数 )；（事故中）遭严重毁坏的汽车（或飞机等）；（身体或精神上）受到严重损伤的人；状况非常糟糕的车辆（或建筑物等）v.毁坏[毁灭]某物( wreck的第三人称单数 )；使（船舶）失事，使遇难，使下沉 | |
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hearths
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| 壁炉前的地板，炉床，壁炉边( hearth的名词复数 ) | |
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memorable
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| adj.值得回忆的，难忘的，特别的，显著的 | |
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afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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graveyard
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| n.坟场 | |
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foundered
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| v.创始人( founder的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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76
shipwrecks
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| 海难，船只失事( shipwreck的名词复数 )； 沉船 | |
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partially
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| adv.部分地，从某些方面讲 | |
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noted
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| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
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coppers
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| 铜( copper的名词复数 )； 铜币 | |
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frightful
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| adj.可怕的；讨厌的 | |
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81
presumption
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| n.推测，可能性，冒昧，放肆，[法律]推定 | |
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82
secreted
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| v.（尤指动物或植物器官）分泌( secrete的过去式和过去分词 )；隐匿，隐藏 | |
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83
exigencies
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| n.急切需要 | |
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pebbles
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| [复数]鹅卵石； 沙砾； 卵石，小圆石( pebble的名词复数 ) | |
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85
abrupt
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| adj.突然的，意外的；唐突的，鲁莽的 | |
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86
slate
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| n.板岩，石板，石片，石板色，候选人名单；adj.暗蓝灰色的，含板岩的；vt.用石板覆盖，痛打，提名，预订 | |
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87
rambling
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| adj.[建]凌乱的，杂乱的 | |
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sloop
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| n.单桅帆船 | |
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89
shuffled
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| v.洗（纸牌）( shuffle的过去式和过去分词 )；拖着脚步走；粗心地做；摆脱尘世的烦恼 | |
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tacks
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| 大头钉( tack的名词复数 )； 平头钉； 航向； 方法 | |
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91
hoist
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| n.升高，起重机，推动；v.升起，升高，举起 | |
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rusty
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| adj.生锈的；锈色的；荒废了的 | |
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bower
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| n.凉亭，树荫下凉快之处；闺房；v.荫蔽 | |
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wriggling
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| v.扭动，蠕动，蜿蜒行进( wriggle的现在分词 )；（使身体某一部位）扭动；耍滑不做，逃避（应做的事等）；蠕蠕 | |
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95
voracious
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| adj.狼吞虎咽的，贪婪的 | |
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96
distress
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| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
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97
beheld
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| v.看，注视( behold的过去式和过去分词 )；瞧；看呀；（叙述中用于引出某人意外的出现）哎哟 | |
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98
strand
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| vt.使（船）搁浅，使（某人）困于（某地） | |
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99
jaws
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| n.口部；嘴 | |
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100
asunder
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| adj.分离的，化为碎片 | |
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101
gulf
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| n.海湾；深渊，鸿沟；分歧，隔阂 | |
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102
riddles
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| n.谜（语）( riddle的名词复数 )；猜不透的难题，难解之谜 | |
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103
hopping
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| n. 跳跃 动词hop的现在分词形式 | |
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104
plover
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| n.珩，珩科鸟，千鸟 | |
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105
mowing
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| n.割草，一次收割量，牧草地v.刈，割( mow的现在分词 ) | |
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106
incessantly
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| ad.不停地 | |
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107
hovering
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| 鸟( hover的现在分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
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108
beetles
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| n.甲虫( beetle的名词复数 ) | |
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109
strewed
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| v.撒在…上( strew的过去式和过去分词 )；散落于；点缀；撒满 | |
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110
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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111
tract
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| n.传单，小册子，大片(土地或森林) | |
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112
remarkably
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| ad.不同寻常地，相当地 | |
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113
manure
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| n.粪，肥，肥粒；vt.施肥 | |
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114
dwarfish
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| a.像侏儒的，矮小的 | |
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115
dense
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| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
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116
mildewing
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| v.（使）发霉，（使）长霉( mildew的现在分词 ) | |
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117
hearty
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| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
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118
draught
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| n.拉，牵引，拖；一网（饮，吸，阵)；顿服药量，通风；v.起草，设计 | |
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119
turnips
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| 芜青( turnip的名词复数 )； 芜菁块根； 芜菁甘蓝块根； 怀表 | |
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120
beets
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| 甜菜( beet的名词复数 )； 甜菜根； （因愤怒、难堪或觉得热而）脸红 | |
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121
dispersed
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| adj. 被驱散的, 被分散的, 散布的 | |
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122
cargoes
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| n.（船或飞机装载的）货物( cargo的名词复数 )；大量，重负 | |
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123
destined
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| adj.命中注定的；(for)以…为目的地的 | |
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124
desolate
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| adj.荒凉的，荒芜的；孤独的，凄凉的；v.使荒芜，使孤寂 | |
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125
lamentable
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| adj.令人惋惜的，悔恨的 | |
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126
lasting
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| adj.永久的，永恒的；vbl.持续，维持 | |
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127
blessing
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| n.祈神赐福；祷告；祝福，祝愿 | |
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128
intervention
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| n.介入，干涉，干预 | |
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129
mounds
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| 土堆，土丘( mound的名词复数 )； 一大堆 | |
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130
wayfarer
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| n.旅人 | |
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131
scarlet
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| n.深红色，绯红色，红衣；adj.绯红色的 | |
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132
edible
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| n.食品，食物；adj.可食用的 | |
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133
cranberry
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| n.梅果 | |
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134
surmounted
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| 战胜( surmount的过去式和过去分词 )； 克服（困难）； 居于…之上； 在…顶上 | |
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135
dwelling
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| n.住宅，住所，寓所 | |
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136
whitewashed
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| 粉饰，美化，掩饰( whitewash的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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137
butts
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| 笑柄( butt的名词复数 )； （武器或工具的）粗大的一端； 屁股； 烟蒂 | |
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138
ascended
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| v.上升，攀登( ascend的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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139
winding
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| n.绕，缠，绕组，线圈 | |
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140
scent
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| n.气味，香味，香水，线索，嗅觉；v.嗅，发觉 | |
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141
rusting
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| n.生锈v.（使）生锈( rust的现在分词 ) | |
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142
conversing
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| v.交谈，谈话( converse的现在分词 ) | |
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143
lighting
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| n.照明，光线的明暗，舞台灯光 | |
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144
panes
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| 窗玻璃( pane的名词复数 ) | |
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145
shutter
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| n.百叶窗；(照相机)快门；关闭装置 | |
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146
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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147
kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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148
provident
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| adj.为将来做准备的，有先见之明的 | |
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149
congealed
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| v.使凝结，冻结( congeal的过去式和过去分词 )；（指血）凝结 | |
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150
exertion
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| n.尽力，努力 | |
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151
moths
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| n.蛾( moth的名词复数 ) | |
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152
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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153
nautical
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| adj.海上的，航海的，船员的 | |
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154
revolving
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| adj.旋转的，轮转式的；循环的v.（使）旋转( revolve的现在分词 )；细想 | |
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155
concealed
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| a.隐藏的，隐蔽的 | |
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156
wont
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| adj.习惯于；v.习惯；n.习惯 | |
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157
prudent
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| adj.谨慎的，有远见的，精打细算的 | |
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158
providence
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| n.深谋远虑，天道，天意；远见；节约；上帝 | |
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159
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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160
regiment
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| n.团，多数，管理；v.组织，编成团，统制 | |
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161
steering
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| n.操舵装置 | |
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162
verge
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| n.边，边缘；v.接近，濒临 | |
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163
gulls
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| n.鸥( gull的名词复数 )v.欺骗某人( gull的第三人称单数 ) | |
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164
astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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165
looming
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| n.上现蜃景（光通过低层大气发生异常折射形成的一种海市蜃楼）v.隐约出现，阴森地逼近( loom的现在分词 )；隐约出现，阴森地逼近 | |
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166
narrative
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| n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的 | |
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167
varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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168
aurora
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| n.极光 | |
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169
looms
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| n.织布机( loom的名词复数 )v.隐约出现，阴森地逼近( loom的第三人称单数 )；隐约出现，阴森地逼近 | |
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170
behooves
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| n.利益，好处( behoof的名词复数 )v.适宜( behoove的第三人称单数 ) | |
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171
bunk
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| n.(车、船等倚壁而设的)铺位；废话 | |
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172
solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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173
queries
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| n.问题( query的名词复数 )；疑问；询问；问号v.质疑，对…表示疑问( query的第三人称单数 )；询问 | |
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174
chamber
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| n.房间，寝室；会议厅；议院；会所 | |
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175
sleepless
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| adj.不睡眠的，睡不著的，不休息的 | |
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176
yarns
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| n.纱( yarn的名词复数 )；纱线；奇闻漫谈；旅行轶事 | |
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