Those Whom You See Are Not The
Best Of Their Class; The More Enterprising And Industrious Have Boats Of
Their Own, And Carry On The Fishery On Their Own Account."
We found the Queen a strong steamboat, with a good cabin and convenient
state-rooms, but dirty, and smelling of fish from stem to stern.
It has
seemed to me that the further north I went, the more dirt I found. Our
captain was an old Aberdeen seaman, with a stoop in his shoulders, and
looked as if he was continually watching for land, an occupation for
which the foggy climate of these latitudes gives him full scope. We left
Wick between eleven and twelve o'clock in the forenoon, and glided over a
calm sea, with a cloudless sky above us, and a thin haze on the surface of
the waters. The haze thickened to a fog, which grew more and more dense,
and finally closed overhead. After about three hours sail, the captain
began to grow uneasy, and was seen walking about on the bridge between the
wheel-houses, anxiously peering into the mist, on the look-out for the
coast of the Orkneys. At length he gave up the search, and stopped the
engine. The passengers amused themselves with fishing. Several coal-fish,
a large fish of slender shape, were caught, and one fine cod was hauled up
by a gentleman who united in his person, as he gave me to understand, the
two capacities of portrait-painter and preacher of the gospel, and who
held that the universal church of Christendom had gone sadly astray from
the true primitive doctrine, in regard to the time when the millennium is
to take place.
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