We were now rapidly opening Long
Bay (as the chart called it), a deep recess running out squarely at
either extremity, the bight of it crossed by a beach, and a line of
tumbling breakers, that extended for close upon three miles.
Above the beach a forest of tall trees, in height and colour at once
distinguishable from the thick bush we had hitherto been passing,
screened the bases of a range of hills which obviously formed the
backbone of the island; and as the whole bay crept into view we
discerned in the north (or, to be accurate, N.N.E.) corner of this
long recess a marshy valley dividing the scrub from the forest.
The mouth of this valley, where it widened out upon the beach,
measured at least half a mile across. The chart marked it as Misery
Swamp, and indicated a river there. We could detect none, or, at any
rate, no river entrance. If river there were, doubtless it emptied
its waters through the fringe of grey-green weeds, and dispersed over
the flat-looking foreshore; but even at two miles' distance it looked
to be a dismal, fever-haunted spot.
By contrast, the noble range of woodland to southward of it and the
rocky peaks that rose in delicate shadow above the tree-tops were
beautiful as a dream, even to eyes fresh from the forest scenery of
Jamaica; and while Plinny leant with me against the bulwarks, I felt
that in the silence immortal verse was shaping itself, which it did
after a while to this effect--
"Arrived o'er the limitless ocean
In 16 degrees of N.
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