and thought of the memorable day when Columbus's ship first plunged
her bows into the tangled 'ocean meadow,' and the sailors, naturally
enough, were ready to mutiny, fearing hidden shoals, ignorant that
they had four miles of blue water beneath their keel, and half
recollecting old Greek and Phoenician legends of a weedy sea off the
coast of Africa, where the vegetation stopped the ships and kept
them entangled till all on board were starved.

Day after day we passed more and more of it, often in long
processions, ranged in the direction of the wind; while, a few feet
below the surface, here and there floated large fronds of a lettuce-
like weed, seemingly an ulva, the bright green of which, as well as
the rich orange hue of the sargasso, brought out by contrast the
intense blue of the water.

Very remarkable, meanwhile, and unexpected, was the opacity and
seeming solidity of the ocean when looked down on from the bows.
Whether sapphire under the sunlight, or all but black under the
clouds, or laced and streaked with beads of foam, rising out of the
nether darkness, it looks as if it could resist the hand; as if one
might almost walk on it; so unlike any liquid, as seen near shore or
inland, is this leaping, heaving plain, reminding one, by its
innumerable conchoidal curves, not of water, not even of ice, but
rather of obsidian.

After all we got little of the sargasso. Only in a sailing ship,
and in calms or light breezes, can its treasures be explored.
Twelve knots an hour is a pace sufficient to tear off the weed, as
it is hauled alongside, all living things which are not rooted to
it. We got, therefore, no Crustacea; neither did we get a single