Ashore at Chatham Bay, Cocos Island.
Mother was pretty tired, especially as she had a bad sunburn on her back and shoulders and I broke the blisters by putting my arms around her to steady myself, and sometimes I even had to climb down her back to lower myself from one high rock to another six feet below.
The night before this trip up the river, we had a furious gale. The wind blew harder [[95]]than I ever felt it, and for a time the rain came in a solid mass like a warm wet curtain, streaming across the decks. Everything was soaked, chairs fell over, curtains were tangled up, doors slammed. And then the boobies kept flying right into the ship banging their heads and bodies against things and stunning themselves. They dropped headlong into the “lab” where we were sitting, they fell to the floor in our cabins if the doors were open for a minute, and all over the decks the poor things were crouching around squawking. And they vomited up fish all over the place.
This is a curious habit with some birds; they seem to do it as a forfeit to another bird. They cough up their food which the other bird then takes as payment, leaving the stranded one alone without pecking him. White-headed terns flew aboard too. We were all of us busy throwing them overboard.
In the middle of all the gale and rain and wind, the five rowboats which were over the [[96]]side tied to the boom by lines, had to be brought on board. A mate stood on the top of the gangway, a life preserver on a long line in the water in case someone fell overboard, and then one by one five men went out on the boom, to the end, down the rope ladder, into a tangled up and bouncing boat, and then rowed it aft to be hoisted up by other men onto the ship. It was all quite exciting and I stood in the rain a long time watching.
The next morning it was all calm again and you couldn’t believe there had been a small hurricane the night before.
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