While Not Off, On These Wood And Water Parties, Or Up The Rivers
To The Missions, We Had Very Easy Times On Board The Ship.
We were
moored, stem and stern, within a cable's length of the shore, safe
from south-easters, and with
Very little boating to do; and as it
rained nearly all the time, awnings were put over the hatchways,
and all hands sent down between decks, where we were at work,
day after day, picking oakum, until we got enough to caulk the ship
all over, and to last the whole voyage. Then we made a whole suit
of gaskets for the voyage home, a pair of wheel-ropes from strips
of green hide, great quantities of spun-yarn, and everything else
that could be made between decks. It being now mid-winter and
in high latitude, the nights were very long, so that we were not
turned-to until seven in the morning, and were obliged to knock
off at five in the evening, when we got supper; which gave us
nearly three hours before eight bells, at which time the watch
was set.
As we had now been about a year on the coast, it was time to think
of the voyage home; and knowing that the last two or three months
of our stay would be very busy ones, and that we should never have
so good an opportunity to work for ourselves as the present, we all
employed our evenings in making clothes for the passage home, and more
especially for Cape Horn.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 342 of 618
Words from 93560 to 93820
of 170236
