Page 303 - Malay sketches

EVENING

shoots rays of gold over Penang in the north and
the Binding Islands in the south, seventy miles
This for a space up-
apart. golden light spreads
ward through the bank of clouds, till, paling into a
belt of grey that again deepens into blue, and ever
gaining in intensity, it rises to the zenith and fills
the empyrean.
Meanwhile the darkness which seemed to be
over the distant eastern is
settling ranges gradually
suffused with soft tints of rose doree, transfiguring
peak after peak and clearly defining every ridge and
This aftermath of wherein the sun
valley. day,
returns to kiss the hills with one last lingering
caress, fills the whole atmosphere with a rosy
then fades 'Twixt
effulgence, reluctantly away.
western sea and eastern hill lies that great sea-
indented plain over which night settles slowly but
while still the and hills are vivid with
surely, sky
colour. But even the plain assumes its night garb
with no less grace and beauty. A faint mist has
risen from swamp and river, and, spreading itself
over the land, takes soft hues of opal and heliotrope
deepening into purple, while only the pools and
river-reaches shine out, like of mirror steal-
scraps
ing borrowed glory from the sky.
Soon this light wanes ; purple turns to grey, the
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