Distant mountains lay wrapped in dissolving mists, and seemed like the
multifarious tents of a great army encamped on a plain--for the smooth
sea was like a plain. The chamber of the dawn seemed gigantic, the
mountains having lifted up the roof of heaven higher than I had ever
seen it before, the sea having taken it out to a far horizon.

I stood looking over the shore before sunrise, and far out in the bay
were three high-masted feluccas, looking like ships of the Spanish
Armada. At the water's edge, and yet silhouetted against the dawn sky,
were Mahometans, washing themselves and praying--stark, black figures
in the strange light.

I welcomed the sun.

He rose swiftly out of the waters, and shone across the bay, lighting
up all the mountains that closed in north and south. He came full of
promises, and after the coolness and damp of the night I had need of
heat. I lay on a bank and gleaned sunshine. The morning came over the
sea steadily, equably, like a good ship making for a sure harbour.

Then, ten miles from Gudaout, on a mountain, I looked out from the
ruins of the Tower of Iver, over a vast resplendent sea, and saw below
me the monastery of Novy Afon and all its buildings, looking like
children's toys. That tower was a stronghold of Christianity in
the third century, and it was strange to think that Crusaders and
mediaeval warriors had looked out from the same tower, over the same
glorious sea. Assuredly from the watch-tower of ancient Time all
buildings and man's dwellings are but toys. I thought of that when I
rowed across the river Phasis, and drank coffee at Poti on the site