I
wished much I could have accompanied him, but by this time I was
completely prostrated by sea-sickness.
The weather, though blowy, continued very fine till Tuesday at four
o'clock, when Papa came down and told me to prepare for a gale; an
ominous black cloud had shown itself in the north-west horizon; this
would not of itself have created much sensation, had it not been
accompanied by an extraordinary fall in the barometer; it had, in fact,
been falling for twenty-four hours, for at noon on Monday it stood
rather above 30, and at midnight was as low as 29.55, which, in these
latitudes, is a great fall. But on Tuesday, at nine A.M., it had fallen
to 28.80, when it began rapidly to sink, till at half-past three it
stood at 28.40, showing a fall of more than an inch and a half since the
preceding day at noon. It seems that this is almost unprecedented, so
that when the little black cloud appeared, every sail was taken in, and
the main topmast and fore top-gallantmast lowered down on deck, and this
was not done a bit too soon, for by half-past four, it blew a hurricane.
The captain told a naval officer on board, that he had thought of
putting the ship's head towards the gale, to let it blow past, but on
further consideration, he put her right before it, though at the expense
of losing a good deal of ground, as it made us go four points out of our
course.
Pages:
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285