Читать книгу Men Against the Sea – Book Set. The Greatest Maritime Adventure Novels: The Bounty Trilogy, Lost Island, The Hurricane, Botany Bay, The Far Lands, Tales of the South Seas… онлайн

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Toward evening we raised three small islands to the northwest, about seven leagues distant, passing them at nightfall, when we snugged down to a reefed foresail. Had our circumstances been happier, I might have enjoyed more fully the emotion aroused by sailing an unknown sea, studded with islands on which no European had hitherto laid eyes.

Nelson was possessed of that most precious of gifts: an inquiring and philosophical turn of mind. Even in our situation, with not one chance in a thousand, as it seemed, of seeing England again, he was able to derive pleasure from the contemplation of the sea and the sky by day, and the stars by night. He regarded each island we passed, no matter how distant, with an inquiring eye, speculating as to whether it was of volcanic or of coralline formation, whether it was inhabited, and what vegetation might spring from its soil. When we passed shoals of fish, he named them, and the birds diving and hovering overhead. And what little I know of astronomy was learned from Nelson during the long nights on the Bounty’s launch.