Story of Chester Lawrence | Page 3

a thousand precious souls.
Chester slept fairly well, and was awake next morning at daylight. Though the ship was pitching and rocking, he felt no indications of sea-sickness. He gazed out of the port-hole at the racing waves. Some of them rose to his window, and he looked into a bank of green water. He got up and dressed. It was good to think he would not be sick. Very few were stirring. A number who were, like himself, immune, were briskly pacing the deck. Chester joined them and looked about. This surely must be a storm, thought he. He had often wished to witness one, from a safe position, of course, and here was one. As far as he could see in every direction, the ocean was one mass of rolling, seething water. At a distance it looked like a boiling pot, but nearer the waves rose higher, the ship's prow cutting them like a knife.
"Quite a storm," said Chester to a man washing the deck.
"Storm? Oh, no, sir; just a bit of a blow."
No one seemed to have any concern regarding the safety of the ship, so Chester concluded that there was no danger, that this was no storm at all, which conclusion was right, as he had later to acknowledge. The sun came up through a wild sea into a wild sky, casting patches of shifting light on the waters to the east. Chester kept a lookout for his friends, the elders. When the breakfast gong sounded, Elder Malby appeared.
"Where are the others?" asked Chester.
"They'll not get up today; perhaps not tomorrow. I see you are all right. You're lucky. Come, let us go to breakfast."
Most of the seats were vacant at the table that morning. A few smilingly looked around, secure in their superior strength. Others were bravely trying to do the right thing by sitting down to a morning meal; but a number of these failed, some leaving quietly and deliberately, others rushing away in unceremonial haste. Chester was quite alone on his side of the table. If there had been a trifle of "sinking emptiness" in him before, the meal braced him up wonderfully. In this he thought he had discovered a sure cure for sea-sickness. One day later he imparted this information to a lady voyager, who received it with the exclamation, "Oh, horrors!"
All that day the wind was strong, and the sea rough. Even an officer acknowledged that if this weather kept up, the "blow" might grow into a storm. From the upper deck Chester and Elder Malby looked out on the sublime spectacle. Like great, green, white-crested hills, the waves raced along the vast expanse. Towards the afternoon the ship and the wind had shifted their course so that the waves dashed with thunderous roar against the iron sides of the vessel which only heaved and dipped and went steadily on its way.
A number of ladies crowded on deck, and, aided by the stewards, were safely tucked into chairs in places protected from wind and spray. The deck stewards tempted them with broth, but they only sipped it indifferently. These same ladies, just the day before had carried their feather-tipped heads ever so stately. Now, alas, how had the mighty leveler laid them low! They did not now care how their gowns fitted, or whether their hats were on straight. Any common person, not afflicted with sea-sickness, could have criticised their attitude in the chairs. One became so indifferent to correct appearances that she slid from her chair on to the deck, where she undignifiedly sprawled. The deck steward had to tuck her shawls about her and assist her to a more lady-like position.
"That's pretty tough," remarked Chester.
"All the wits have tried their skill on the subject of sea-sickness," said his companion; "but it's no joke to those who experience it."
"Can't we help those ladies?" asked Chester.
"Not very much. You will find the best thing to do is to let them alone. They'll not thank you, not now, for any suggestion or proffer of help. If you should be so foolish as to ask them what you could do for them, they would reply, if they replied at all, 'Stop the ship for five minutes.'"
"Then I'll be wise," said Chester.
The night came on, dark and stormy. The two friends kept up well. They ate the evening meal with appetite, then went on deck again.
Night adds awfulness to the sublimity of a storm at sea. The world about the ship is in wild commotion. The sky seems to have dropped into the sea, and now joins the roaring waves as they rush along. The blackness of the night is impenetrable, save as the lights from the ship gleam for an instant into the moving mass of water. Now and then a wave, rearing