say to the seaman, "You shall be blind"; it restricts merely the
range of his vision and raises the dread of land within his breast.
It makes of him a man robbed of half his force, of half his
efficiency. Many times in my life, standing in long sea-boots and
streaming oilskins at the elbow of my commander on the poop of a
homeward-bound ship making for the Channel, and gazing ahead into
the gray and tormented waste, I have heard a weary sigh shape
itself into a studiously casual comment:

"Can't see very far in this weather."

And have made answer in the same low, perfunctory tone

"No, sir."

It would be merely the instinctive voicing of an ever-present
thought associated closely with the consciousness of the land
somewhere ahead and of the great speed of the ship. Fair wind,
fair wind! Who would dare to grumble at a fair wind? It was a
favour of the Western King, who rules masterfully the North
Atlantic from the latitude of the Azores to the latitude of Cape
Farewell. A famous shove this to end a good passage with; and yet,
somehow, one could not muster upon one's lips the smile of a
courtier's gratitude. This favour was dispensed to you from under
an overbearing scowl, which is the true expression of the great
autocrat when he has made up his mind to give a battering to some
ships and to hunt certain others home in one breath of cruelty and
benevolence, equally distracting.

"No, sir. Can't see very far."