enant, by turns headed the watches. Three of these officers,
including Mad Jack, were strict disciplinarians, and never permitted us
to lay down on deck during the night. And, to tell the truth, though it
caused much growling, it was far better for our health to be thus kept
on our feet. So promenading was all the vogue. For some of us, however,
it was like pacing in a dungeon; for, as we had to keep at our
stations--some at the halyards, some at the braces, and elsewhere--and
were not allowed to stroll about indefinitely, and fairly take the
measure of the ship's entire keel, we were fain to confine ourselves to
the space of a very few feet. But the worse of this was soon over. The
suddenness of the change in the temperature consequent on leaving Cape
Horn, and steering to the northward with a ten-knot breeze, is a
noteworthy thing. To-day, you are assailed by a blast that seems to
have edged itself on icebergs; but in a little more than a week, your
jacket may be superfluous.

One word more about Cape Horn, and we have done with it.

Years hence, when a ship-canal shall have penetrated the Isthmus of
Darien, and the traveller be taking his seat in the ears at Cape Cod
for Astoria, it will be held a thing almost incredible that, for so
long a period, vessels bound to the Nor'-west Coast from New York
should, by going round Cape Horn, have lengthened their voyages some
thousands of miles. "In those unenlightened days" (I quote, in advance,
the language of some future philosopher), "entire years were frequently
consumed in making the voyage to and from the Spice Islands, the
present fashionable watering-place of the beau-monde of Oregon." Such
must be our national progress.

Why, sir, that boy of yours will, one of these days, be sending your
grandson to the salubrious city of Jeddo to spend his summer vacations.

CHAPTER XXX.

A PEEP THROUGH A PORT-HOLE AT THE SUBTERRANEAN PARTS OF A MAN-OF-WAR.

While now running rapidly away from the bitter coast of Patagonia,
battling with the night-watches--still cold--as best we may; come under
the lee of my white-jacket, reader, while I tell of the less painful
sights to be seen in a frigate.

A hint has already been conveyed concerning the subterranean depths of
the Neversink's hold. But there is no time here to speak of the
_spirit-room_, a cellar down in the after-hold, where the sailor's
"grog" is kept; nor of the _cabletiers_, where the great hawsers and
chain