ion divided our sick-bay from the rest of the deck, where the
hammocks of the watch were slung; it, therefore, was exposed to all the
uproar that ensued upon the watches being relieved.

An official, called the surgeon's steward, assisted by subordinates,
presided over the place. He was the same individual alluded to as
officiating at the amputation of the top-man. He was always to be found
at his post, by night and by day.

This surgeon's steward deserves a description. He was a small, pale,
hollow-eyed young man, with that peculiar Lazarus-like expression so
often noticed in hospital attendants. Seldom or never did you see him
on deck, and when he _did_ emerge into the light of the sun, it was
with an abashed look, and an uneasy, winking eye. The sun was not made
for _him_. His nervous organization was confounded by the sight of the
robust old sea-dogs on the forecastle and the general tumult of the
spar-deck, and he mostly buried himself below in an atmosphere which
long habit had made congenial.

This young man never indulged in frivolous conversation; he only talked
of the surgeon's prescriptions; his every word was a bolus. He never
was known to smile; nor did he even look sober in the ordinary way; but
his countenance ever wore an aspect of cadaverous resignation to his
fate. Strange! that so many of those who would fain minister to our own
health should look so much like invalids themselves.

Connected with the sick-bay, over which the surgeon's steward
presided--but removed from it in place, being next door to the
counting-room of the purser's steward--was a regular apothecary's shop,
of which he kept the key. It was fitted up precisely like an
apothecary's on shore, dis-playing tiers of shelves on all four sides
filled with green bottles and gallipots; beneath were multitudinous
drawers bearing incomprehensible gilded inscriptions in abbreviated
Latin.

He generally opened his shop for an hour or two every morning and
evening. There was a Venetian blind in the upper part of the door,
which he threw up when inside so as to admit a little air. And there
you would see him, with a green shade over his eyes, seated on a stool,
and pounding his pestle in a great iron mortar that looked like a
howitzer, mixing some jallapy compound. A smoky lamp shed a flickering,
yellow-fever tinge upon his pallid face and the closely-packed
regiments of gallipots.

Several times when I felt in need of a little medicine, but