For I must confess to having been one of the first attacked when we were well out at sea. It was the first time I had ever seen the blue water; and no sooner did a bit of a gale spring up, and the great steamer begin to climb up the waves and then seem to be falling down, down, down in the most horrible way possible, than I began to prove what a thorough landsman I was, and, like a great many more passengers, was exceedingly ill.
I remember thinking that it would have been much better if I had stayed at home instead of tempting the seas.
Then as I grew worse I called myself by all sorts of names for coming upon such a mad expedition.
Then I vowed that if I could get on shore again, I’d never come to sea any more.
Lastly I grew so bad that I didn’t care what became of me, and I felt that if the steamer sank I should be relieved from all my terrible pains.
And all this time Tom was skipping about the deck as merry as a lark, chaffing with the sailors or making friends with the firemen, and every now and then coming to me and making me so cross that I felt as if I could hit him.
“Now do let me fetch the doctor to you, Mas’r Harry,” he kept on saying, pulling a solemn face, but with his eyes looking full of fun.
“I tell you I don’t want the doctor. Don’t be such an ass, Tom,” I cried.
“But you do seem so ill, Mas’r Harry,” he said with mock sympathy. “Let me see if I can get you some brimstone and treacle.”
“Just you wait till I get better, Tom,” I said feebly. “You nasty wretch, you. Brimstone and treacle! Ugh!”