after _roosting_ for fifteen or twenty
minutes on the main royal yard, came down and reported that he could see
nothing; but that the sun shone so brightly on the water that, if any
thing was within the range of sight, the reflection of the sunbeams
would render it invisible. Morton could not repress a vague
apprehension that there was some vessel in chace, though it would have
sorely puzzled him to give his whys and wherefores. After having pointed
his glass for the fiftieth time towards the eastern horizon, without
seeing any thing but smooth water and the dim, blue, cloudy-looking
mountains, the man at the wheel notified him that it was "eight bells,"
or eight o'clock. Having gone below to compare the watch in the cabin
with the half-hour glass in the binnacle, he returned to the
quarter-deck and called out,

"Strike the bell eight--call the watch."

The bell was struck, and one of the watch on deck, after a preliminary
thumping with the large end of a handspike upon the forecastle,
vociferated down the fore scuttle,

"All the starboard watch, ahoy! Rouse out there, starbowlines--show a
leg or an arm!"

This last phrase designates the manner in which "turning out" of a
hammock is accomplished, which hammock, a person unacquainted with such
kind of sleeping accommodations, would never dream contained a live man,
until one or the other of the aforementioned limbs was protruded. In a
few minutes the wheel was relieved, and the crew were clustering around
the galley with their tin pots, joking, and laughing, and shouting
"scaldings!" as they hurried forward with their respective allowances of
hot coffee.

In the mean time the quarter-deck received an accession of company. Mr.
Walker came up the companion-way, gaping and rubbing his eyes, and
carrying his jacket on his arm. With a short "good morning!" to Morton
he threw his jacket upon the hen-coop, proceeded to the lee gangway,
drew a bucket of water, and commenced his morning's ablutions. Captain
Williams next came on deck, and immediately looked round upon the
weather with a troubled and disappointed air, for it was now almost
quite a calm. Mr. Edwards and Dr. Bolton followed him--not that they had
any business on deck, or cared much about leaving the cabin or their
respective state-rooms oftener than was necessary; but it is not, or was
not, in my sea-going days, esteemed genteel for passengers, or any other
"idlers," to stay below while the steward was occupie