"But I called you first," he cried, stamping with impatience.
"Ladies must always be served first, Herr Commerzienrath," smilingly remarked the captain, who was coming aft from the forward deck.
"O, you can talk: you are used to this abominable cold," growled the commerzienrath.
I went below again, but not to stay long. The cry for warm plates had grown general, and a hard job I had of it to satisfy the impatient clamors from all quarters. The weather had in the mean time grown rougher, and the fog increased in density. I observed that the captain's jovial face grew graver and graver, and once I heard him say to a passenger who had the appearance of a seafaring man:
"If we were only well out of the cursed channel once. With this wind the largest ships can come in; and we can not see a hundred paces ahead."
I knew enough of seamanship fully to comprehend the captain's uneasiness; and I had another anxiety of my own besides.
My superior, namely, the engineer Weiergang, had visibly with every hour sunk deeper and deeper into meditation upon the felicities attending the copious indulgence in Swedish punch; and though he still mechanically stood at his post and performed his duties about the engine, where now, as the vessel was going steadily ahead, there was but little to do, I still did not leave the engine-room without considerable uneasiness. How easily might it happen that the narrowness of the channel should render a complicated manœuvre necessary, and was the nodding figure there in a condition to carry it out?
I had gone on deck with another plate, intended for no other than the blue-eyed, vivacious beauty. She had resumed her old place at the bow, and gave me a friendly nod as I approached.
"I give you a great deal of trouble," she said.
"No trouble at all," I answered, with a bow.