12th. Being fine and calm in the mid-day, the Hold was opened and various packages got up for examination and re-stowage; while this was doing, and loose straw laying about on deck, there was a cry "the Caboose is on fire!" This only occasioned a momentary panic, as luckily no harm arose from it; the chimney was foul, and some fat taking fire had communicated to the soot, and from thence nearly to the main-sheet.
This day we took up a cask which upon tapping proved full of excellent brandy; it was covered with barnacles, and had probably been floating four or five months.
15th. A Hawk of a small kind, resembling the Sparrow Hawk of England, was this morning caught in the rigging; the nearest land being supposed above three hundred miles renders this an [8] extraordinary circumstance: we also saw yesterday a large brown bird pursuing a Gull, and understood its name to be Rump-poke. An appropriate appellation, as it pursues other birds for their droppings, which it catches as they fall and feeds upon.
18th. We have experienced so many head winds and calms that the spirits of all, not excepting the Captain, are cast down,—two thousand five hundred miles yet to run. Yesterday a lady a cabin passenger, was safely delivered of a boy her first child.
22d. Favorable breezes. A quarrel between the cook and a sailor, in which the former knocked out three of the latter's teeth with a billet of wood; and for which he underwent a severe cobbing.[3]
24th. Two Whales of the Grampus kind rose near the vessel. At 7 A. M. a large fish was seen to pass the ship tormented by a shoal of small ones; the Captain ordered the boat down, went out, struck it, and it was got on board; it proved to be a Sun-fish that weighed one hundred weight and a half: it was quickly cut to pieces, dressed, [9] and eaten by the ship's company and some of the passengers; the flesh very white and firm.
SHIP COOKERY
Anything but clean,—anything but simple,—anything but what one is used to.
SITUATION OF A PASSENGER ON BOARD SHIP
Some risk,—little comfort,—a total inversion of all accustomed habits,—a feeling of insecurity,—irritability,—a longing to be ashore; in short, a total be-blue-devilment at times, with a few hours of pleasanter colour just to keep hope alive.