A gallant Dutch seaman, a cool and stern observer, who has passed his whole life at sea, frankly tells us that his feeling on first seeing the ocean was _fear_. For all terrestrial animals, water is the non-respirable element, the ever heaving but inevitably asphyxiating enemy; the fatal and eternal barrier between the two worlds. We need not, all things being considered, be at all surprised, if that immense mass of waters which we call the sea, dark and inscrutable in its immense depths, ever and always impresses the human mind with a vague and resistless awe. The imaginative Orientals see it only and call it only, as, the _Night of the Depths_. In all the antique tongues, from India to Ir…
Your support pays for translating these classics into more languages.
Support for $12/month DonateSubscribers read with instant translation, without waiting for the free daily limit.