The next morning shone bright and clear, if ever a March morning
did. The beguiling month was coming in like a lamb, with whatever
storms it might go raging out. It was long since Philip had tasted
the freshness of the early air on the shore, or in the country, as
his employment at the shop detained him in Monkshaven till the
evening. And as he turned down the quays (or staithes) on the north
side of the river, towards the shore, and met the fresh sea-breeze
blowing right in his face, it was impossible not to feel bright and
elastic. With his knapsack slung over his shoulder, he was prepared
for a good stretch towards Hartlepool, whence a coach would take him
to Newcastle before night. For seven or eight miles the level sands
were as short and far more agreeable a road than the up and down
land-ways. Philip walked on pretty briskly, unconsciously enjoying
the sunny landscape before him; the crisp curling waves rushing
almost up to his feet, on his right hand, and then swishing back
over the fine small pebbles into the great swelling sea. To his left
were the cliffs rising one behind another, having deep gullies here
and there between, with long green slopes upward from the land, and
then sudden falls of brown and red soil or rock deepening to a yet
greater richness of colour at their base towards the blue ocean
before him. The loud, monotonous murmur of the advancing and
receding waters lulled him into dreaminess; the sunny look of
everything tinged his day-dreams with hope. So he trudged merrily
over the first mile or so; not an obstacle to his measured pace on
the hard, level pavement; not a creature to be seen since he had
left the little gathering of bare-legged urchins dabbling in the
sea-pools near Monkshaven. The cares of land were shut out by the
glorious barrier of rocks before him. There were some great masses
that had been detached by the action of the weather, and lay half
embedded in the sand, draperied over by the heavy pendent
olive-green seaweed. The waves were nearer at this point; the
advancing sea came up with a mighty distant length of roar; here and
there the smooth swell was lashed by the fret against unseen rocks
into white breakers; but otherwise the waves came up from the German
Ocean upon that English shore with a long steady roll that might
have taken its first impetus far away, in the haunt of the
sea-serpent on the coast of 'Norroway over the foam.' The air was
soft as May; right overhead the sky was blue, but it deadened into
gray near the sea lines. Flocks of seagulls hovered about the edge
of the waves, slowly rising and turning their white under-plumage to
glimmer in the sunlight as Philip approached. The whole scene was so
peaceful, so soothing, that it dispelled the cares and fears (too
well founded in fact) which had weighed down on his heart during the
dark hours of the past night.