It was time; the commission had been a long one, and the sanitary condition of the ship was not everything that could be desired. This was principally owing to the millions of gigantic cockroaches that swarmed everywhere.
There were very many other creepie-creepies on board the Osprey as well as cockroaches. Of these latter there were two species, one the little sort, about three-quarters of an inch in length, the other, the true Blatta orientalis, two inches and a half from stem to stern, with feelers three inches long, of immense breadth of beam, spiked legs, and an outspread of wing when they flew of about three inches.
Well, there were many kinds of spiders, scorpions, earwigs, an occasional tarantula, whose bite may produce delirium and death, and whole colonies of little ants. But now and then a gigantic centiped would appear, and these are dreaded even more than are snakes.
So on the whole, the Osprey at the tail end of the commission offered a fine field for the study of natural history.
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Homeward-bound! What joy it spreads over every heart on board a ship, from that of the boy who helps the cook, feeds the pets, and gets kicked about by all hands, to the captain himself, who, if he does not say much, cannot hide the pleasure that beams in his face and eyes.
There is a commander in the Royal Navy (retired), still alive while I write, who was present at the funeral of Britain's greatest hero, Admiral Nelson. This officer might well be called the father of the navy, for he is now in his hundredth year.
Well, had he come on board on Saturday night while the Osprey was making her long homeward-bound passage from the Cape to England, he would certainly have considered himself back once more in the dear days of old.
There certainly was not the same amount of tossing of cans, but the main-brace was spliced by the captain's orders, and away forward down below, around the galley and at the fo'c's'le head, many a song was heard, many a yarn spun, and many a heart beat high and warm with the thoughts of home and Merrie England.
It really appeared that the Osprey herself knew she was homeward bound.