ried her sprit-sail-yard; and when she sunk her stern, her flying
jib-boom stood up like the mizzenmast. I waited until this job of
snugging the sail was finished, and then made haste to get off the
forecastle, where the seas flew so continuously and heavily that had I
not kept a sharp lookout, I should several times have been knocked
overboard.

Partly out of curiosity and partly with a wish to hearten the men, I
looked into the forecastle before going aft. There were sliding-doors
let into the entrance on either side the windlass, but one of them was
kept half open to admit air, the forescuttle above being closed. The
darkness here was made visible by an oil lamp,--in shape resembling a
tin coffee-pot with a wick in the spout,--which burned black and
smokily. The deck was up to my ankles in water, which gurgled over the
pile of swabs that lay at the open entrance. It took my eye some
moments to distinguish objects in the gloom; and then by degrees the
strange interior was revealed. A number of hammocks were swung against
the upper deck and around the forecastle were two rows of bunks, one
atop the other. Here and there were sea-chests lashed to the deck; and
these, with the huge windlass, a range of chain cable, lengths of rope,
odds and ends of pots and dishes, with here a pair of breeches hanging
from a hammock, and there a row of oilskins swinging from a
beam,--pretty well made up all the furniture that met my eye.

The whole of the crew were below. Some of the men lay smoking in their
bunks, others in their hammocks with their boots over the edge; one was
patching a coat, another greasing his boots; others were seated in a
group talking; while under the lamp were a couple of men playing at
cards upon a chest, three or four watching and holding on by the
hammocks over their heads.

A man, lying in his bunk with his face toward me, started up and sent
his legs, incased in blanket trousers and brown woolen stockings,
flying out.

"Here's Mr. Royle, mates!" he called out. "Let's ask him the name of
the port the captain means to touch at for proper food, for we aren't
goin' to wait much longer."

"Don't ask me any questions of that kind, my lads," I replied promptly,
seeing a general movement of heads in the bunks and hammocks. "I'd
give you proper victuals if I had the ordering of them; and I have
spoken to Captain Coxon about you, and I am sure he will see this
matter put to rights."

I had difficul