they climbed up the far side of the road , through the last thin ranks of trees to the shore : the narrow harbor still stretched out a long way southward to the open sea , and there at her mouth laurence saw with a shocking , nearly painful sensation , the tremendous immensity of a dragon transport : four masts , the british colors flying stained to red with a last sun-beam , and a great horde of beasts upon her dragondeck tangled in a riot of serpentine colors .