fore, and finally the mainsail fill and swell out again; again all is taut above, a great plump cheek of gold, and away and away we dance, all alive, over the buoyant water, and through the singing air. Or perhaps the boom is being gybed, and swings deliberately over above our heads, to the strain of brawny shoulders at the bitts, and a hoarse accompaniment of “Come in! Way-hay! Ay-way! Hay-ho! As she will! Now then! Again! As she must! Come in!” Or we are just coming to anchor and it is, “Haul down your outer jib!” in stentorian tones from the wheel. “Haul down outer jib,” in obedient response from the bow . . . more orders, further echoes. Then the rattling of the anchor-chain over the deck, the scamper of the hands to make down fore and main sail and, lo! the Tikirau, with her wings furled—and yet how beautiful still!—and tethered, and yet how still alive!
Often when evening came and the rest of our mates that were not on duty had turned in, the dogs and I would get up on the house roof, and there, warm between their slumbering forms, I might watch the night come on. . . . First, the late grave twilight, sky and water both fading, stars peeping out dim-eyed above the swinging trucks; then, glimmering dusk, with points of light brightening out all around, and faint wakes beginning to trail down through the guessed-at glassy swell; last, the immense Dark, powdered with sparkling constellations overhead, infinite in number, each one a world; and paved with a floor of wandering blackness, here and there streamered with light from above, and with a pathway of softest wool-white glimmering astern,
