The Argosy — page 302: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

On the South Coast. 283 To the right were long reaches of shallow water, an island beyond, and behind us might be seen a forest of masts sheltering in Poole harbour. Already the afternoon was waning, and the light of a lowering sun flushed the long flat reaches into something like romance, gilding the island opposite, and checkering our path at intervals with long shadows from the trees. ‘The masts in Poole harbour looked black and still against the sky, glowing red and crimson. Amidst all there was neither sound nor symptom of life ; a long melancholy road checkered by melancholy trees. Yet more melancholy when, my visit paid, darkness had quite fallen, and we made the best of our way back by a direct and much nearer route. This is perhaps the prettiest drive about Bournemouth. ‘‘INVALIDS’ WALK,’’ BOURNEMOUTH. The sunsets here are remarkable; more beautiful and gorgeous, as it seemed to me, than those usually seen in England: another point in which Bournemouth resembles in some degree a foreign town. They reminded me almost of mild Norwegian skies (the intense sunsets of Norway cannot be expected in lower latitudes), and of the evenings one sees falling over the shores of Southern Europe. I was told that these evenings were not exceptional, but that Bournemouth 1s noted for its singularly vivid sunsets. One evening in especial I remember. The white fleecy clouds which are so beautiful, and which so often accompany a N.W. wind, were sailing along overhead, moving with that appalling silence which seems to belong to space, save when the thunder clap awakens the eternal solitudes. The sun sank to the horizon like a molten ball, the white vapours flushed with a crimson glow, and the whole scene COMIC OOO SS (C(O) o~