"Conrad, Joseph - The Mirror Of The Sea" - читать интересную книгу автора (Conrad Joseph)

The Mirror of the Sea




Contents:


I. Landfalls and Departures
IV. Emblems of Hope
VII. The Fine Art
X. Cobwebs and Gossamer
XIII. The Weight of the Burden
XVI. Overdue and Missing
XX. The Grip of the Land
XXII. The Character of the Foe
XXV. Rules of East and West
XXX. The Faithful River
XXXIII. In Captivity
XXXV. Initiation
XXXVII. The Nursery of the Craft
XL. The Tremolino
XLVI. The Heroic Age



CHAPTER I.



"And shippes by the brinke comen and gon,
And in swich forme endure a day or two."
THE FRANKELEYN'S TALE.


Landfall and Departure mark the rhythmical swing of a seaman's life
and of a ship's career. From land to land is the most concise
definition of a ship's earthly fate.

A "Departure" is not what a vain people of landsmen may think. The
term "Landfall" is more easily understood; you fall in with the
land, and it is a matter of a quick eye and of a clear atmosphere.
The Departure is not the ship's going away from her port any more
than the Landfall can be looked upon as the synonym of arrival.
But there is this difference in the Departure: that the term does
not imply so much a sea event as a definite act entailing a process
- the precise observation of certain landmarks by means of the
compass card.

Your Landfall, be it a peculiarly-shaped mountain, a rocky