When "hammocks" was blown by the ship's bugler at a quarter to seven, we found it difficult to make our way forward to the nettings. One moment we were toiling up the deck's steep incline; the next, the ship would bury her prow, and we were rushing forward pell mell. The boat seemed to be endowed with diabolical intelligence that night. A man might, perchance, stoop to tie his shoe or examine a freshly stubbed toe, when the ship would seem to divine that she had him at a disadvantage, and would leap forward so that he would immediately stand on his head, or affectionately and firmly embrace a convenient stanchion. "Pride cometh before a fall," and the man who thought he had caught the swing and could walk a chalk line on the deck, soon found that the old boat knew a new trick or two, and in a twinkling of an eye he was sawing the air frantically with his arms, in his efforts to keep his balance.
Though the force of the tropical storm was soon spent, the sea continued high, and locomotion was difficult.
The hammocks were given out by the "hammock stowers" of the watch on duty. They called out the numbers stenciled on our "dream bags," and the owners stepped forward and claimed them. As soon as a man secured his hammock he immediately slung it in place, unlashed it, and arranged the blankets to his liking.
A group gathered around the capstan aft, after the hammock ceremony had been completed.
Some one said, "I'm glad I can sleep in a hammock a night like this; the heave of the ship will be hardly felt."
"Yes," responded the "Kid," "I wouldn't swap my 'sleeping bag' for the captain's bed, to-night."
"That reminds me," said "Stump." "Speaking of beds—when we were in New York a friend of mine came aboard to see me. He had a sister, but left her at home."
"You can thank your lucky stars he did. If she'd seen your weary, coal-covered visage, you could not even have been a brother to her," interrupted "Hay."
"I guess you're right," responded "Stump," with an appreciative grin. "Anyhow, she did not come. So when her brother got home she plied him with questions—this he wrote me afterwards—wanted to know how I looked, asked what the ship was like, inquired about our food, and then she questioned him about my stateroom. Was it prettily decorated? Whose photograph occupied the place of honor on my dressing table?
"Billy, my friend," explained "Stump," "is a facetious sort of chap, so he told her that of course such a large crew could not all have staterooms, but I had a very nice one, that could be folded when not in use, and put to one side out of the way. It was made of canvas, he said, so constructed that it would always swing with the ship, and so keep upright in a rolling sea.