The floor was so hard that the horse's feet made no
impression on it. Very few men, quite a number of Indians, more women,
and a still larger quantity of dogs made up the inhabitants.
Leaving here the road led back from the sea shore and over quite a level
table land, covered with a big growth of grass and some timber, and then
down to the sandy shore again where the mountain comes so close that we
were crowded down to the very water's edge. Here the never-tiring waves
were still following each other to the shore and dashing themselves to
pieces with such a noise that I felt awed to silence. What a strange
difference in two parts of the earth so little distance from each other!
Here was a waste of waters, there was a waste of sands that may some
time have been the bottom of just such a dashing, rolling sea as this.
And here, between the two, was a fertile region covered with trees,
grass and flowers, and watered with brooks of fresh, sweet water.
Paradise and Desolation! They surely were not far apart. Here I saw some
of the queer things that wash on shore, for we camped close to the
beach.
It was a circumstance of great interest to me to see the sun slowly go
down into the great ocean. Slowly and steadily it went, getting redder
and redder as it went down, then it just touched the distant water and
the waves dashed over more and more of its face till all was covered.
Were it not for the strong, bright rays that still shot up across the
sky one might think it was drowned forever, but in the morning it came
up over the mountain top, having apparently made half the circuit of the
globe.
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