“Well, if we do, we do, boy. We’re in for it, so what’s the good o’ making a fuss?”
“I don’t see no good in being drowned without saying a word,” grumbled Esau. “We two paid ever so much for the passage, and a pretty passage it is.”
“Oh, it’ll be all right if you keep quiet; but if you get wandering about as you do, we shall have you going right through the bulk-head, and have to get the carpenter to cut you out with a saw.”
“Wish he was as ill as I am,” whispered Esau.
“Thank ye,” said the man, nodding at him. “My eyes are a bit queer, but my ears are sharp.”
“Where do you suppose we are?” I said.
“Off Spain somewhere, and I dare say we shall be in smooth water before long. Shan’t be sorry for a little fresh air myself.”
I was longing for it, our experience being not very pleasant down in the crowded steerage; and I must confess to feeling sorry a good many times that I had come.
But after a couple more days of misery, I woke one morning to find that the ship was gliding along easily, and in the sweet, fresh air and warm sunshine we soon forgot the troubles of the storm.
The weather grew from pleasantly warm to terribly hot, with calms and faint breezes; and then as we sailed slowly on we began to find the weather cooler again, till by slow degrees we began to pass into wintry weather, with high winds and showers of snow. And this all puzzled Esau, whose knowledge of the shape of the earth and a ship’s course were rather hazy.