This was Thursday and the ship was to sail on Saturday. It seemed to me a long time to wait for when I go anywhere I like to go in a hurry.
Saturday morning came and I arose bright and early. I slept very little that night, for I was thinking, thinking, thinking. After arising and having a cup of coffee I took my time strolling down toward the steamship pier. After I arrived there I was about to enter the long covered shed, when an official strode up to me and asked me where I was going. I carried no baggage of any sort and didn't think I needed any. I am too old a traveler to encumber myself with baggage. All I carried was on my person. I told the official I was bound for Europe on the Furnessia and showed him my ticket. He looked at it and let me pass. I went on board.
When I reached the deck a young man dressed in a white jacket and peaked cap asked me if I were a married man.
I didn't think it was any of his business, so I asked him what he wanted to know for.
The young fellow frowned and exclaimed: "Don't give me no language, young feller; I want to know if yer married or single." I told him I was a single man, whereupon he said: "You go forward to the quarters for single men!"
"Where's that?" queried I.
"For'ard of the main hatch," responded he. I didn't know the difference between a main hatch and a chicken hatch, but I went up to the front part of the vessel where I saw several sailors slinging trunks down a hole by means of a rope. I walked up to them and asked one of them who wasn't too busy to answer a question, where the main hatch was.
"It's in the fo'-castle," says Jack, with a wink at his mates; "do you want it?"
"No," said I. "I don't; where's the quarters for the single men."
"Oh, that's what you're after, is it? You follows your nose till you gets to the bows, and then you'll see a companionway down which you goes."