Before us the blue sea and the blue land-line were
fading into mournful grey, on which one huge West Indiaman blazed
out, orange and scarlet, her crowded canvas all a-flame from the
truck to the water's edge.--A few moments and she, too, had vanished
into the grey twilight, and a chill night-wind crisped the sea. It
was a relief to hear the Evening Hymn rise rich and full from one
voice, and then another and another, till the men chimed in one by
one, and the whole cutter, from stem to stern, breathed up its melody
into the silent night.
But the hymn soon flagged--there was more mirth on board than could
vent itself in old Charles Wesley's words; and one began to hum a
song tune, and then another, with a side glance at the expression of
the Lady Abbess's face, till at last, when a fair wife took courage,
and burst out with full pipe into 'The sea, the sea,' the ice was
fairly broken; and among jests and laughter one merry harmless song
after another rang out, many of them, to Claude's surprise,
fashionable London ones, which sounded strangely enough out there on
the wild western sea.
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