1 All round me were little ripples, combing over with a sharp, bristling sound and slightly phosphorescent.
2 All round the hull, in the blackness, the rippling current bubbled and chattered like a little mountain stream.
3 But there was no unusual sound--nothing but the low wash of the ripple and the croaking of the inmates of the wood.
4 Even the ripples were a danger to our overloaded craft, but the worst of it was that we were swept out of our true course and away from our proper landing-place behind the point.
5 In the second place, the ebb was now making--a strong rippling current running westward through the basin, and then south'ard and seaward down the straits by which we had entered in the morning.
6 The ship was talking, as sailors say, loudly, treading the innumerable ripples with an incessant weltering splash; and until I got my eye above the window-sill I could not comprehend why the watchmen had taken no alarm.
7 It was one January morning, very early--a pinching, frosty morning--the cove all grey with hoar-frost, the ripple lapping softly on the stones, the sun still low and only touching the hilltops and shining far to seaward.
8 The water scarcely reached my waist; the sand was firm and covered with ripple marks, and I waded ashore in great spirits, leaving the HISPANIOLA on her side, with her main-sail trailing wide upon the surface of the bay.
9 Even then I was still so much interested, waiting for the ship to touch, that I had quite forgot the peril that hung over my head and stood craning over the starboard bulwarks and watching the ripples spreading wide before the bows.