And he went on smoking his pipe with a quiet chuckle which told how well he understood the whims of his beloved. Two hours afterward she came back, sure enough, very meek and very cold, for the wind was blowing in her face.
The day being Saturday, the sailors are busy by turns at the wash-tub, to have a clean turn-out for Sunday, on which day, even in this remote corner of the world, everybody puts on his best, and at Sunday morning muster my people present a very neat and creditable appearance. The gray uniform which I have adopted as a dress-suit is always worn on that occasion, both by officers and men. Each officer has a sailor for a "washerwoman," and I have mine; and Knorr has just brought me in the most encouraging accounts of his skill, and as a proof of it I found on my table, when I came in out of the moonlight from a tramp to the open water, (where I had been making some observations for temperature,) a well-starched and neatly ironed cambric handkerchief, sprinkled with cologne.
A CHEERFUL DAY.
The day, for some reason or other, seems to have been peculiarly bright and cheerful to everybody, and the cheerfulness runs on into the evening. I fancy that our old cook was in a more than usually good humor, and doubtless this has had something to do with it. For my own part, I must acknowledge the power of his artistic skill as affecting the moral sentiments. My walk to the open water was both cold and fatiguing. Desiring to get out as far as I could, I sprang over the loose ice-tables, and reached an iceberg near "The Twins," which I mounted; and, after digging a hole into it, found that it had a temperature only 8° lower than the temperature of the water that floated it, which was 29°. I scrambled back to the fast ice as quickly as I could, for the tide and wind, which was strong from the land, looked very much as if they intended to carry the raft out to sea.
JOHN WILLIAMS, THE COOK.
To come back to the cook,—I was in a condition upon my return to do ample justice to a fillet of venison, garnished with currant-jelly, which was awaiting me, and upon the preparation of which the cook had evidently exhausted all his skill; and afterward Knorr made for me, with my alcohol furnace, a cup of aromatic Mocha.
And so one may find pleasure even where Bacchus and Cupid deign not to come. True, this is the region into which Apollo voluntarily wandered after the decree of Olympus made him an exile, and where the Hellenic poets dreamed of men living to an incredible age, in the enjoyment of all possible felicity; but, to say the truth, I question the wisdom of the banished god, as tradition makes no mention of a schooner, and I find that in this "Residence of Boreas" one must look out for himself pretty sharply,—poets to the contrary, notwithstanding.
The cook brought me the dinner himself. "I tinks de Commander likes dis," said he, "coming from de cold."
"Yes, cook, it is really superb. Now, what can I do for you?"
"Tank you, sar! I tinks if de Commander would only be so kind as to give me a clean shirt, I shall be very tankful. He see dis one be very dirty, and I gets no time to vash him."