To the Ends of the Earth Read Free Page B

if you was to put me, or most seamen, on a horse, our kidneys would be shook clear down to our knees.”
    I groaned some sort of answer, and heard Wheeler extract the cork from a bottle.
    “Consider, sir,” said he, “it is but learning to ride a ship. You will do that soon enough.”
    The thought comforted me; but not as much as the most delectable odour which came o’er my spirits like the warm south . I opened my eyes and lo, what had Wheeler done but produce a huge dose of paregoric? The comfortable taste took me straight back to the nursery and this time with none of the melancholy attendant on memories of childhood and home! I sent Wheeler away, dozed for a while then slept. Truly, the poppy would have done more for old Seneca than his philosophy!
    I woke from strange dreams and in such thick darkness that I knew not where I was but recollected all too soon and found our motion sensibly increased. I shouted at once for Wheeler. At the third shout—accompanied I admit with more oaths than I generally consider consistent with either common sense or gentlemanly conduct—he opened the door of my hutch.
    “Help me out of here, Wheeler! I must get some air!”
    “Now you lie still for a while, sir, and in a bit you’ll be right as a trivet! I’ll set out a bowl.”
    Is there, can there be, anything sillier, less comforting than the prospect of imitating a trivet? I saw them in my mind’s eye as smug and self-righteous as a convocation of Methodists. I cursed the fellow to his face. However, in the upshot he was being reasonable enough. He explained that we were having a blow . He thought my greatcoat with the triple capes too fine a garment to risk in flying salt spray. He added, mysteriously, that he did not wish me to look like a chaplain! He himself, however, had in his possession an unused suit of yellow oilskin. Ruefully enough, he said he had bought it for a gentleman who in the event had never embarked. It was just my size and I should haveit for no more than he had given for it. Then at the end of the voyage I might sell it back to him at second hand if I chose. I closed there and then with this very advantageous offer, for the air was stifling me and I longed for the open. He eased and tied me into the suit, thrust India rubber boots on my feet and adjusted an oilskin hat on my head. I wish your lordship could have seen me for I must have looked a proper sailor, no matter how unsteady I felt! Wheeler assisted me into the lobby, which was running with water. He kept up his prattle as, for example, that we should learn to have one leg shorter than the other like mountain sheep. I told him testily that since I visited France during the late peace, I knew when a deck was atilt, since I had not walked across on the water. I got out into the waist and leaned against the bulwarks on the larboard , that is the downward, side of the deck. The main chains and the huge spread of the ratlines—oh Falconer, Falconer!—extended above my head, and above that a quantity of nameless ropes hummed and thrummed and whistled. There was an eye of light showing still, but spray flew over from the high, starboard side and clouds that raced past us seemed no higher than the masts. We had company, of course, the rest of the convoy being on our larboard hand and already showing lights, though spray and a smoky mist mixed with rain obscured them. I breathed with exquisite ease after the fetor of my hutch and could not but hope that this extreme, even violent, weather would blow some of the stench out of her. Somewhat restored I gazed about me, and found for the first time since the anchor was raised my intellect and interest reviving. Staring up and back, I could see two helmsmen at the wheel, black, tarpaulined figures, their faces lighted from below as they glanced alternately into the illuminated compass, then up at the set of the sails. We had few of these spread to the wind and I supposed it was due tothe inclemency of the