CHAPTER XXII
DISCOVERIES
This little circumstance of the mallards always flying over him and awaybehind, when flushed, presently made Felix speculate on the cause, andhe kept a closer watch. He now saw (what had, indeed, been going on forsome time) that there was a ceaseless stream of waterfowl, mallards,ducks, coots, moorhens, and lesser grebes coming towards him, swimmingto the westward. As they met him they parted and let him through, orrose and went over. Next he noticed that the small birds on the islandswere also travelling in the same direction, that is against the wind.They did not seem in any haste, but flitted from islet to islet, bush totree, feeding and gossiping as they went; still the movement wasdistinct.
Finches, linnets, blackbirds, thrushes, wrens, and whitethroats, andmany others, all passed him, and he could see the same thing going on tohis right and left. Felix became much interested in this migration, allthe more singular as it was the nesting-time, and hundreds of thesebirds must have left their nests with eggs or young behind them. Nothingthat he could think of offered an adequate explanation. He imagined hesaw shoals of fishes going the same way, but the surface of the waterbeing ruffled, and the canoe sailing rapidly, he could not be certain.About an hour after he first observed the migration the stream of birdsceased suddenly.
There were no waterfowls in the water, and no finches in the bushes.They had evidently all passed. Those in the van of the migratory armywere no doubt scattered and thinly distributed, so that he had beenmeeting the flocks a long while before he suspected it. The nearer heapproached their centre the thicker they became, and on getting throughthat he found a solitude. The weeds were thicker than ever, so that hehad constantly to edge away from where he supposed the mainland to lie.But there were no waterfowls and no birds on the islets. Suddenly as herounded a large island he saw what for the moment he imagined to be aline of white surf, but the next instant he recognised a solid mass, asit were, of swallows and martins flying just over the surface of thewater straight towards him. He had no time to notice how far theyextended before they had gone by him with a rushing sound. Turning tolook back, he saw them continue directly west in the teeth of the wind.
Like the water and the islands, the sky was now cleared of birds, andnot a swallow remained. Felix asked himself if he were running into someunknown danger, but he could not conceive any. The only thing thatoccurred to him was the possibility of the wind rising to a hurricane;that gave him no alarm, because the numerous islands would affordshelter. So complete was the shelter in some places, that as he passedalong his sail drew above, while the surface of the water, almostsurrounded with bushes and willows, was smooth. No matter to how manyquarters of the compass the wind might veer, he should still be able toget under the lee of one or other of the banks.
The sky remained without clouds; there was nothing but a slight haze,which he sometimes fancied looked thicker in front or to the eastward.There was nothing whatever to cause the least uneasiness; on thecontrary, his curiosity was aroused, and he was desirous of discoveringwhat it was that had startled the birds. After a while the water becamerather more open, with sandbanks instead of islands, so that he couldsee around him for a considerable distance. By a large bank, behindwhich the ripple was stilled, he saw a low wave advancing towards him,and moving against the wind. It was followed by two others at shortintervals, and though he could not see them, he had no doubt shoals offishes were passing and had raised the undulations.
The sedges on the sandbanks appeared brown and withered, as if it hadbeen autumn instead of early summer. The flags were brown at the tip,and the aquatic grasses had dwindled. They looked as if they could notgrow, and had reached but half their natural height. From the lowwillows the leaves were dropping, faded and yellow, and the thorn busheswere shrivelled and covered with the white cocoons of caterpillars. Thefarther he sailed the more desolate the banks seemed, and trees ceasedaltogether. Even the willows were fewer and stunted, and the highestthorn bush was not above his chest. His vessel was now more exposed tothe wind, so that he drove past the banks and scattered islands rapidly,and he noticed that there was not so much as a crow on them. Upturnedmussel-shells, glittering in the sunshine, showed where crows had beenat work, but there was not one now visible.
Felix thought that the water had lost its clearness and had becomethick, which he put down to the action of the wavelets disturbing thesand in the shallows. Ahead the haze, or mist, was now much thicker, andwas apparently not over a mile distant. It hid the islands and concealedeverything. He expected to enter it immediately, but it receded as heapproached. Along the strand of an island he passed there was a darkline like a stain, and in still water under the lee the surface wascovered with a floating scum. Felix, on seeing this, at once concludedthat he had unknowingly entered a gulf, and had left the main Lake, forthe only place he had ever seen scum before was at the extremity of acreek near home, where the water was partly stagnant on a marshy level.The water of the Lake was proverbial for its purity and clearness.
He kept, therefore, a sharp look-out, expecting every moment to sightthe end of the gulf or creek in which he supposed himself sailing, sothat he might be ready to lower his sail. By degrees the wind had risentill it now blew with fury, but the numerous sandflats so broke up thewaves that he found no inconvenience from them. One solitary gull passedover at a great height, flying steadily westwards against the wind. Thecanoe now began to overtake fragments of scum drifting before the wind,and rising up and down on the ripples. Once he saw a broad piece rise tothe surface together with a quantity of bubbles. None of the sandbanksnow rose more than a foot or so above the surface, and were entirelybare, mere sand and gravel.
The mist ahead was sensibly nearer, and yet it eluded him; it was of afaint yellow, and though so thin, obscured everything where it hovered.From out of the mist there presently appeared a vast stretch of weeds.They floated on the surface and undulated to the wavelets, a paleyellowish green expanse. Felix was hesitating whether to lower his sailor attempt to drive over them, when, as he advanced and the mistretreated, he saw open water beyond. The weeds extended on either handas far as he could see, but they were only a narrow band, and hehesitated no longer. He felt the canoe graze the bottom once as hesailed over the weeds. The water was free of sandbanks beyond them, buthe could see large islands looming in several directions.
Glancing behind him he perceived that the faint yellow mist had closedin and now encircled him. It came with two or three hundred yards, andwas not affected by the wind, rough as it was. Quite suddenly he noticedthat the water on which the canoe floated was black. The wavelets whichrolled alongside were black, and the slight spray that occasionally flewon board was black, and stained the side of the vessel. This greatlyastonished and almost shocked him; it was so opposite and contrary toall his ideas about the Lake, the very mirror of purity. He leant over,and dipped up a little in the palm of his hand; it did not appear blackin such a small quantity, it seemed a rusty brown, but he became awareof an offensive odour. The odour clung to his hand, and he could notremove it, to his great disgust. It was like nothing he had ever smeltbefore, and not in the least like the vapour of marshes.
By now being some distance from any island, the wavelets increased insize, and spray flew on board, wetting everything with this blackliquid. Instead of level marshes and the end of the gulf, it appeared asif the water were deep, and also as if it widened. Exposed to the fullpress of the gale, Felix began to fear that he should not be able toreturn very easily against it. He did not know what to do. The horridblackness of the water disposed him to turn about and tack out; on theother hand, having set out on a voyage of discovery, and having nowfound something different to the other parts of the Lake, he did notlike to retreat. He sailed on, thinking to presently pass theseloathsome waters.
He was now hungry, and indeed thirsty, but was unable to drink becausehe had no water-barrel. No vessel sailing on the Lake ever carried awater-barrel, since such pure water was always under their bows.
He wascramped, too, with long sitting in the canoe, and the sun wasperceptibly sloping in the west. He determined to land and rest, andwith this purpose steered to the right under the lee of a large island,so large, indeed, that he was not certain it was not part of themainland or one side of the gulf. The water was very deep close up tothe shore, but, to his annoyance, the strand appeared black, as ifsoaked with the dark water. He skirted along somewhat farther, and founda ledge of low rocks stretching out into the Lake, so that he wasobliged to run ashore before coming to these.
On landing, the black strand, to his relief, was fairly firm, for he haddreaded sinking to the knees in it; but its appearance was so unpleasantthat he could not bring himself to sit down. He walked on towards theledge of rocks, thinking to find a pleasanter place there. They werestratified, and he stepped on them to climb up, when his foot went deepinto the apparently hard rock. He kicked it, and his shoe penetrated itas if it had been soft sand. It was impossible to climb up the reef. Theground rose inland, and curious to see around him as far as possible, heascended the slope.
From the summit, however, he could not see farther than on the shore,for the pale yellow mist rose up round him, and hid the canoe on thestrand. The extreme desolation of the dark and barren ground repelledhim; there was not a tree, bush, or living creature, not so much as abuzzing fly. He turned to go down, and then for the first time noticedthat the disk of the sun was surrounded with a faint blue rim,apparently caused by the yellow vapour. So much were the rays shorn oftheir glare, that he could look at the sun without any distress, but itsheat seemed to have increased, though it was now late in the afternoon.
Descending towards the canoe, he fancied the wind had veeredconsiderably. He sat down in the boat, and took some food; it waswithout relish, as he had nothing to drink, and the great heat had tiredhim. Wearily, and without thinking, he pushed off the canoe; she slowlyfloated out, when, as he was about to hoist up the sail, a tremendousgust of wind struck him down on the thwarts, and nearly carried himoverboard. He caught the mast as he fell, or over he must have gone intothe black waves. Before he could recover himself, she drifted againstthe ledge of rocks, which broke down and sank before the bow, so thatshe passed over uninjured.
Felix got out a paddle, and directed the canoe as well as he could; thefury of the wind was irresistible, and he could only drive before it. Ina few minutes, as he was swept along the shore, he was carried betweenit and another immense reef. Here, the waves being broken and lesspowerful, he contrived to get the heavy canoe ashore again, and, jumpingout, dragged her up as far as he could on the land. When he had donethis, he found to his surprise that the gale had ceased. The tremendousburst of wind had been succeeded by a perfect calm, and the waves hadalready lost their violent impetus.
This was a relief, for he had feared that the canoe would be utterlybroken to pieces; but soon he began to doubt if it were an unmixedbenefit, as without a wind he could not move from this dismal place thatevening. He was too weary to paddle far. He sat on the canoe to resthimself, and, whether from fatigue or other causes, fell asleep. Hishead heavily dropping on his chest partly woke him several times, buthis lassitude overcame the discomfort, and he slept on. When he got uphe felt dazed and unrefreshed, as if sleeping had been hard work. He wasextremely thirsty, and oppressed with the increasing heat. The sun hadsunk, or rather was so low that the high ground hid it from sight.