It Is Now Blowing Hard Again, And We Have Just Been Taken Right
Aback.
Luckily, I had lashed my desk to my washing-stand, or that
would have flown off, as I did off my chair.
I don't think I shall
know what to make of solid ground under my feet. The rolling and
pitching of a ship of this size, with such tall masts, is quite
unlike the little niggling sort of work on a steamer - it is the
difference between grinding along a bad road in a four-wheeler, and
riding well to hounds in a close country on a good hunter. I was
horribly tired for about five days, but now I rather like it, and
never know whether it blows or not in the night, I sleep so
soundly. The noise is beyond all belief; the creaking, trampling,
shouting, clattering; it is an incessant storm. We have not yet
got our masts quite safe; the new wire-rigging stretches more than
was anticipated (of course), and our main-topmast is shaky. The
crew have very hard work, as incessant tacking is added to all the
extra work incident to a new ship. On Saturday morning, everybody
was shouting for the carpenter. My cabin was flooded by a leak,
and I superintended the baling and swabbing from my cot, and
dressed sitting on my big box. However, I got the leak stopped and
cabin dried, and no harm done, as I had put everything up off the
floor the night before, suspicious of a dribble which came in.
Then my cot frame was broken by my cuddy boy and I lurching over
against S-'s bunk, in taking it down.
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