The week had passed, and the next day the ship was clear of its dockyard artisans. Shipwrights, riggers, and the rest of them had gone, and leaving the painting to be done by his crew during calms, the captain received his orders, the frigate was unmoored, and Syd watched from one of the little windows the receding waves, becoming more and more conscious of the fact that there was wind at work and tide in motion.
The time went on, and he knew that there was the land on one side and a verdant island on the other, but somehow he did not admire them, and when Roylance came to him in high glee to call him to dinner, with the announcement that there were roast chickens and roast leg of pork as a wind-up before coming down to biscuit and salt junk, Syd said he would not come.
“But chickens, man—chickens roast.”
“Don’t care for roast chickens,” said Syd.
“Roast pork then, and sage and onions.”
“Oh, I say, don’t!” cried Syd, with a shudder.
“Well, I must go, or I shan’t get a morsel,” cried Roylance, and he hurried away.
“How horrible!” thought the boy. “I do believe I’m going to be sea-sick, just like any other stupid person who goes a voyage for the first time.”
Before evening the frigate had passed high chalk bluffs on the left, and on the right a wide bay, with soft yellow sandy shore. Then there was chalk to right and the open channel to left; then long ranges of limestone cliffs, dotted with sea-birds, and then evening and the land growing distant, the waves rising and falling, and as he went to his hammock that night Syd uttered a groan.
“What’s the matter, lad?” cried Roylance, who was below.