A day or two since I applied to Capt. J. to sell or lend me a little oil for my own special use during the long nights we have just begun to encounter. This led to an examination of the ship's stock of oil, when it was ascertained that but a few gallons remained, which it was necessary to husband with the greatest care. To remedy the inconvenience of remaining in almost total darkness, the occupants of the main cabin have invented a variety of lamps, which they manufacture out of bottles and phials, cutting them off by means of strings, which they pass rapidly round them till they become heated by the friction, and then dipping them in water. These lamps they fill with "slush"—grease left by the cooks,—which, though a poor substitute for oil, they are happy to get.
June 11. A large white albatross flew round the ship to-day with other birds. I threw out a baited hook for him, while the mate stood by with an open knife, threatening to cut the line. I caught the bird several times by the bill, and drew him close under the stern, but he slipped from the hook, and thus saved the amiable mate the trouble of executing his threat.
The cold has increased to such a degree, that Captain J. has set up a stove in the ladies' cabin. The owners of the ship have also supplied a stove for our room, but the captain tells us there is not wood enough for it—though we are convinced he knows better—and therefore refuses to have it set up. So we must make up our minds for a cold passage round Cape Horn. The ladies are making some additional preparations for warding off the cold. Two of them have made themselves hoods, and after searching in vain among their stores for cotton to stuff them with, they have—by permission—attacked my comforter, and supplied themselves.
June 13. For a week past we have been drifting about within little more than a day's sail of the Falkland Islands, beating against head winds, encountering squalls of wind, accompanied by rain, hail and snow, almost every hour of the day, and making but very little progress. This state of things is very irksome to us, and we are not a little impatient. The days are very short, and the nights dark and dreary. Our situation is any thing but agreeable, and yet we often find some little thing to amuse us, and the veriest trifles will sometimes answer this purpose. One night during a squall, some of the passengers were out assisting the sailors in furling the sails, when a small spar gave way and broke. "There," exclaimed one of them, "that whiffletree has gone to the devil!" The idea of a whiffletree as one of the spars of a ship, amused the crew, and our volunteer sailors were thereafter denominated "the Whiffletree Watch."
June 14. Another disgraceful scene occurred in the ladies' cabin this morning, being a continuation of the quarrel that took place a week since between our worthy captain and Julia Spaulding. The altercation between them was very violent, a part of which I overheard. Captain J. was in great wrath, smote his fists together, and repeatedly called Julia a liar; told her he would have no more of her lies, charged her indirectly with having attempted to seduce him, and threatened to shut her up and feed her by herself. All this intermingled with much profane and other violent language towards a female is by no means calculated to remove the strong dislike, which the passengers entertain for Captain J. They also very naturally side with the woman, who, they think, tells quite as many truths as falsehoods in the matter.
June 15. I lay this morning looking from the single remaining pane of glass in my window upon a bright sky, which I have not often had an opportunity to observe in this region of clouds and storms, and looking for the first time upon the Magellan Clouds, and contemplating the brilliant constellations in the heavens, among which the Southern Cross shone conspicuously. The Cross has been in view for several weeks; but though I have seen it several times, I have not until recently been certain of its identity, and our intelligent officers could give me no information concerning it.
"The Magellan Clouds consist of three small nebulæ in the southern part of the heavens—two bright, like the milky way, and one dark. These are first seen above the horizon soon after crossing the southern tropic. When off Cape Horn they are nearly overhead. The Cross is composed of four stars in that form, and is said to be the brightest constellation in the heavens."[A]
I received a little act of kindness in the evening, which I cannot deny myself the pleasure of recording. Soon after supper as I was standing in our cabin, I remarked to a passenger that I had eaten but one biscuit during the day, and that I was really hungry. To his question "why do you not eat some ship-bread?" I replied that I had taken a distaste to it during my seasickness, and the very sight of it had become loathsome to me. It was the same with the beans we had to-day,—boiled beans and pork, which had been served up to us three or four times a week during the voyage. The wife of the chief steward—Mrs. Grant—was present and heard the conversation. She immediately left the cabin and passed to the cooks' galley. In a few minutes she returned, and as she passed by me she cautioned me to be silent, while she slipped a large turnover or fried mince-pie into my coat-pocket. The cooks had made a quantity of them for the captain and ladies, and she had begged this for me. Many such kindnesses have I received from her and other women during the voyage. They derive their value, not from the greatness of the gift bestowed, but from the circumstances in which both the giver and the receiver are placed, and to me, sick, hungry and thirsty as I often have been, I have felt such favors to be of "greater value than stamps in gold, or sums in sealed bags."
The passengers in the main cabin have made these turnovers and the other varieties, which are got up for the inmates of the ladies' cabin, a subject of some pleasantry. They feel that they are equally entitled to these dainties with the other passengers. It was stipulated by the owners of the vessel, that all the passengers should fare alike, and they are naturally sensitive at the distinction which is constantly made to their prejudice; and the more so as the captain and two other men besides Mr. Johnson, have domiciled themselves in the ladies' cabin, where they partake of the best the ship affords, while the majority starve on scouse and boiled beans.
There was a large gathering near the captain's state-room soon after supper to-night, where they continued some time shouting vociferously, and singing a parody on a fine old song, of which I never heard but these two lines: