He Was A Fin, But Spoke English Very Well, And
Gave Me Long Accounts Of His Country; - The Customs, The
Trade,
the towns, what little he knew of the government, (I found he was
no friend of Russia), his voyages,
His first arrival in America,
his marriage and courtship; - he had married a countrywoman of his,
a dress-maker, whom he met with in Boston. I had very little to
tell him of my quiet, sedentary life at home; and, in spite of
our best efforts, which had protracted these yarns through five
or six watches, we fairly talked one another out, and I turned
him over to another man in the watch, and put myself upon my
own resources.
I commenced a deliberate system of time-killing, which united
some profit with a cheering up of the heavy hours. As soon
as I came on deck, and took my place and regular walk, I began
with repeating over to myself a string of matters which I had
in my memory, in regular order. First, the multiplication table
and the tables of weights and measures; then the states of the
union, with their capitals; the counties of England, with their
shire towns; the kings of England in their order; and a large
part of the peerage, which I committed from an almanac that we
had on board; and then the Kanaka numerals. This carried me
through my facts, and, being repeated deliberately, with long
intervals, often eked out the two first bells.
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