Читать книгу The Sea: Its Stirring Story of Adventure, Peril, & Heroism (Vol. 1-4). The History of Sea Voyages, Discovery, Piracy and Maritime Warfare онлайн

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THE CENTAUR AT THE DIAMOND ROCK, MARTINIQUE.

But the good ship must proceed; and as British naval interests are under consideration, let her bows be turned to Bermuda—a colony, a fortress and a prison, and where England owns an extensive floating dock, dock-yards, and workshops.114 Trollope says that its geological formation is mysterious. “It seems to be made of soft white stone, composed mostly of little shells—so soft, indeed, that you might cut Bermuda up with a hand-saw. And people are cutting up Bermuda with hand-saws. One little island, that on which the convicts are established, has been altogether so cut up already. When I visited it, two fat convicts were working away slowly at the last fragment.” Bermuda is the crater of an extinct volcano, and is surrounded by little islets, of which there is one for every day of the year in a space of twenty by three miles. These are surrounded again by reefs and rocks, and navigation is risky.

Were the Bermudas the scene of Ariel’s tricks? They were first discovered, in 1522, by Bermudez, a Spaniard; and Shakespeare seems to have heard of them, for he speaks of the