four o'clock
As far as the eye could reach , sea and shore met in one bleak monotony , flecked by no passing cloud , stirred by no sign of life or motion . Even sound was absent ; the Angelus , rung from the invisible Mission tower far inland , was driven back again by the steady northwest trades , that for half the year had swept the coast line and left it abraded of all umbrage and color . But even this monotony soon gave way to a change and another monotony as uniform and depressed . The western horizon , slowly contracting before a wall of vapor , by four o'clock had become a mere cold , steely strip of sea , into which gradually the northern trend of the coast faded and was lost . As the fog stole with soft step southward , all distance , space , character , and locality again vanished ; the hills upon which the sun still shone bore the same monotonous outlines as those just wiped into space . Last of all , before the red sun sank like the descending Host , it gleamed upon the sails of a trading vessel close in shore . It was the last object visible .