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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“Timor, lads!” he said.

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There were some who doubted the landfall, who could not believe that the goal of our voyage was actually in sight. For all Mr. Bligh’s quiet assurance, and the boatswain’s repeated “Aye, lad! There’s the land—never a doubt of it!” they dared not believe, lest day should come and the dim outlines melt into the shapes of distant clouds. We hauled on a wind to the northeast, and those who could stood on the thwarts from time to time, their confidence in what they saw increasing from moment to moment. Some could do no more than raise themselves to a sitting position in the bottom of the launch, clinging to the thwarts or to the gunwales as they stared ahead.

Veil after veil of moonlit obscurity was drawn aside, and at last, in the clear light of early dawn, there it lay: Paradise itself, it seemed, its lofty outlines filling half the circle of the horizon, bearing from S.W. to N.E. by E. The sun rose, its shafts of level, golden light striking across promontory after promontory. We saw great valleys filled with purple shadow, and, high above the coast, forests appeared, interspersed with glades and lawns that might well have been the haunts where our first parents wandered in the innocence of the world.