I looked aloft--every object appeared sharply cut out against the dark
firmament, and the swaying of the mast--heads to and fro, as the vessel
rolled, was so steady and slow, that they seemed stationary, while it was
the moon and stars which appeared to vibrate and swing from side to side,
high over head, like the vacillation of the clouds in a theatre, when the
scene is first let down.
The masts, and yards, and standing and running rigging, looked like black
pillars, and bars, and wires of iron, reared against the sky, by some
mighty spirit of the night; and the sails, as the moon shone dimly
through them, were as dark as if they had been tarpawlings. But when I
walked forward and looked aft, what a beauteous change! Now each mast,
with its gently swelling canvass, the higher sails decreasing in size,
until they tapered away nearly to a point, though topsail, topgallant
sail, royal and skysails, showed like towers of snow, and the cordage
like silver threads, while each dark spar seemed to be of ebony, fished
with ivory, as a flood of cold, pale, mild light streamed from the
beauteous planet over the whole stupendous machine, lighting up the sand
white decks, on which the shadows of the men, and of every object that
intercepted the moonbeams, were cast as strongly as if the planks had
been inlaid with jet.
There was nothing moving about the decks. The lookouts, aft, and at the
gangways, sat or stood like statues half bronze, half alabaster.
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