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- 5939
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T20:48:15.023Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 5886
- text
- No voice, no low, no howl is heard; the chief sound of life here is a
hiss.
On most of the isles where vegetation is found at all, it is more
ungrateful than the blankness of Aracama. Tangled thickets of wiry
bushes, without fruit and without a name, springing up among deep
fissures of calcined rock, and treacherously masking them; or a parched
growth of distorted cactus trees.
In many places the coast is rock-bound, or, more properly,
clinker-bound; tumbled masses of blackish or greenish stuff like the
dross of an iron-furnace, forming dark clefts and caves here and there,
into which a ceaseless sea pours a fury of foam; overhanging them with
a swirl of gray, haggard mist, amidst which sail screaming flights of
unearthly birds heightening the dismal din. However calm the sea
without, there is no rest for these swells and those rocks; they lash
and are lashed, even when the outer ocean is most at peace with,
itself. On the oppressive, clouded days, such as are peculiar to this
part of the watery Equator, the dark, vitrified masses, many of which
raise themselves among white whirlpools and breakers in detached and
perilous places off the shore, present a most Plutonian sight. In no
world but a fallen one could such lands exist.
Those parts of the strand free from the marks of fire, stretch away in
wide level beaches of multitudinous dead shells, with here and there
decayed bits of sugar-cane, bamboos, and cocoanuts, washed upon this
other and darker world from the charming palm isles to the westward and
southward; all the way from Paradise to Tartarus; while mixed with the
relics of distant beauty you will sometimes see fragments of charred
wood and mouldering ribs of wrecks. Neither will any one be surprised
at meeting these last, after observing the conflicting currents which
eddy throughout nearly all the wide channels of the entire group. The
capriciousness of the tides of air sympathizes with those of the sea.
Nowhere is the wind so light, baffling, and every way unreliable, and
so given to perplexing calms, as at the Encantadas. Nigh a month has
been spent by a ship going from one isle to another, though but ninety
miles between; for owing to the force of the current, the boats
employed to tow barely suffice to keep the craft from sweeping upon the
cliffs, but do nothing towards accelerating her voyage. Sometimes it is
impossible for a vessel from afar to fetch up with the group itself,
unless large allowances for prospective lee-way have been made ere its
coming in sight. And yet, at other times, there is a mysterious
indraft, which irresistibly draws a passing vessel among the isles,
though not bound to them.
True, at one period, as to some extent at the present day, large fleets
of whalemen cruised for spermaceti upon what some seamen call the
Enchanted Ground. But this, as in due place will be described, was off
the great outer isle of Albemarle, away from the intricacies of the
smaller isles, where there is plenty of sea-room; and hence, to that
vicinity, the above remarks do not altogether apply; though even there
the current runs at times with singular force, shifting, too, with as
singular a caprice.
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