No wonder that the
sailor delights in marvelous tales. It is a terrible destroyer, but at
the same time a friend that we cannot do without.
Nowhere perhaps is that closeness to the ocean, this familiarity with
the sea, so strongly felt as at the Isles of Shoals. There is really no
land there: nothing but sky, rock and water. Living there is like a
sea-voyage without the discomforts thereof. During the great storm of
March '52, when the light-house on Minot's Ledge was overturned, an
immense wave rolled across the centre of Appledore from side to side.
There are windows in the hotel on Star Island where one can drop a
pebble into the sea, and go to sleep listening to the murmur of the
waves. Even in summer the surf sometimes runs so high that it is
dangerous to approach the edge of the cliffs; and few people know how
pleasant it is to watch the eddying swirl of the water round the
promontories on the westerly side. One can sail in every direction, and
if the wind does not suit one quarter it always will another. Better
than any sailing, however, is rowing in an open boat at sunset or by
moonlight, with one or two friends.
Their climate is equally remarkable, and Doctor Bowditch considered it,
from its soothing and also stimulating quality, one of the finest in the
world, and much the best on the Atlantic coast. This is owing to their
geographical position, islands on the coast of Maine being afflicted
with cold fogs, and those south of Cape Cod with warm ones.
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