THE CRUELTY OF THE SEA.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVI, Issue 2151, 28 March 1908, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE CRUELTY OF THE SEA.

Joseph Conrad’s popularity is not to be compared with Frank T. Bullen’s, but if the reader wishes to test the comparative value .of the writing of the two men, let him compare Bullen’s latest, “Sack' of Shakings,” with Conrad’s most recent, “Mirror of the Sea.” Hear Conrad describe tlio rescue of a crew and the sinking of a brig: “Something startling, mysterious, hastily confused, was taking place. I watched it with incredulous and fascinated awe as one watches the con, fused, swift movements of some deed of violence done ill the dark. As if at a given signal, the run of the smooth undulations seemed checked suddenly around the brig. By a strange optical delusion the whole sea appeared to rise upon her in ono overwhelming heave of its eilkv surface, where in one snot a smother of foam broke out ferociously. And then the effort subsided. It was all over, and the smooth swell ran mi as before from the horizon in uninterrupted cadence of motion, passing under us with a slight, friendly, toes of our boat,

“Far away, ivliero the_ brig bad been, an angry white stain undulating on the surface of steely-grey water.'.shot. with gleams of green, diminished swiftly, without a hiss, like a patch of pure snow melting in the sun. And "the great stillness after this initiation into the sea’s implacable bate seemed full oi" dread thoughts and shadows of disaster Already I looked with other eyes upon the sen. I knew it capable of betraying the generous ardour of youth as implacably as, indifferent to evil and good, it would have betrayed the basest greed or the noblest heroism. My conception of its magnanimous greatness wis done. And I looked upon the true sen—the sea that plays with men till their hearts are broken, and wears stout skips to death. _ Nothing can touch the brooding bitterness of its heart. Open to all and faithful to nojio, it. excrcise'gMl.s_fam.