Page:A voyage to Abyssinia (Salt).djvu/88

 twelve we passed the point of Doaro, which stands out distinguished from the main land like an island. The line of the coast had hitherto taken a NE. ½ E. direction, and thence it appears to decline more to the northward. At four we again had soundings in twenty-two fathoms, which gradually lessened to nineteen, at which time we were about four leagues from the land, the appearance of which continued uniformly uninteresting, sandy, and barren. The wind was fair and the weather mild. In the evening, we observed the sun before it set put on a very unusual appearance. At the moment of emerging from a dark cloud, when its disk touched the horizon, it seemed to expand beyond its natural dimensions, became of a palish red hue, and assumed a form greatly resembling a portion of a column. This is one of the many singular effects produced by the refraction of the atmosphere, common in this part of the world; and something of the same kind may have given rise to the extraordinary appearances of the heavenly bodies mentioned by Agatharchides, to have occurred at the mouth of the Red Sea (, &c. ) which have been too hastily discredited by succeeding writers. Our latitude at noon was 4° 53′ 30″ N., long. 49° 0′, therm. 78, var. P.M. 5.53 W. Current one mile and a half herper [sic] hour, setting to the N.E.

September 25th.—We lost soundings in the morning off Cape Bassas, where the land for a short time appeared somewhat loftier, but continued to preserve the same uninteresting aspect. In the afternoon the atmosphere became hazy, and the wind freshened.

September 26th.—Lat. 8° 0′ N., long. 50° 0′, therm. 78° at noon: in the evening it fell to 68°, when the weather became extremely cold to the feelings; var. 5° 0′.; wind S.W. At one o'clock in the afternoon, when distant about five leagues from the land, we met with a shoal of dead fish, many thousands of which lay floating on the surface of the water, and we continued to pass through them about five and thirty minutes, sailing at the rate of two leagues in the hour. Many of these fish were of a