Tent Life in Siberia | Page 9

white foaming crests ten feet above the
quarterdeck, and broke into clouds of blinding, strangling spray over
the forecastle and galley, careening the ship until the bell on the
quarter-deck struck and water ran in over the lee gunwale. It did not
exactly correspond with my preconceived ideas of a storm, but I was
obliged to confess that it had many of the characteristic features of the
real phenomenon. The wind had the orthodox howl through the rigging,
the sea was fully up to the prescribed standard, and the vessel pitched

and rolled in a way to satisfy the most critical taste. The impression of
sublimity, however, which I had anticipated, was almost entirely lost in
the sense of personal discomfort. A man who has just been pitched over
a skylight by one of the ship's eccentric movements, or drenched to the
skin by a burst of spray, is not in a state of mind to contemplate
sublimity; and after going through a varied and exhaustive course of
such treatment, any romantic notions which he may previously have
entertained with regard to the ocean's beauty and sublimity are pretty
much knocked and drowned out of him. Rough weather makes short
work of poetry and sentiment. The "wet sheet" and "flowing sea" of the
poet have a significance quite the reverse of poetical when one
discovers the "wet sheet" in his bed and the "flowing sea" all over the
cabin floor, and our experience illustrates not so much the sublimity as
the unpleasantness and discomfort of a storm at sea.
BRIG "OLGA," AT SEA, _July 27, 1865_.
I used often to wonder, while living in San Francisco, where the
chilling fogs that toward night used to drift in over Lone Mountain and
through the Golden Gate came from. I have discovered the laboratory.
For the past two weeks we have been sailing continually in a dense, wet,
grey cloud of mist, so thick at times as almost to hide the topgallant
yards, and so penetrating as to find its way even into our little
after-cabin, and condense in minute drops upon our clothes. It rises, I
presume, from the warm water of the great Pacific Gulf Stream across
which we are passing, and whose vapour is condensed into fog by the
cold north-west winds from Siberia. It is the most disagreeable feature
of our voyage.
Our life has finally settled down into a quiet monotonous routine of
eating, smoking, watching the barometer, and sleeping twelve hours a
day. The gale with which we were favoured two weeks ago afforded a
pleasant thrill of temporary excitement and a valuable topic of
conversation; but we have all come to coincide in the opinion of the
Major, that it was a "curious thing," and are anxiously awaiting the
turning up of something else. One cold, rainy, foggy day succeeds
another, with only an occasional variation in the way of a head wind or

a flurry of snow. Time, of course, hangs heavily on our hands. We are
waked about half-past seven in the morning by the second mate, a
funny, phlegmatic Dutchman, who is always shouting to us to "turn
out" and see an imaginary whale, which he conjures up regularly before
breakfast, and which invariably disappears before we can get on deck,
as mysteriously as "Moby Dick." The whale, however, fails to draw
after a time, and he resorts to an equally mysterious and eccentric
sea-serpent, whose wonderful appearance he describes in comical
broken English with the vain hope that we will crawl out into the raw
foggy atmosphere to look at it. We never do. Bush opens his eyes,
yawns, and keeps a sleepy watch of the breakfast table, which is
situated in the captain's cabin forward. I cannot see it from my berth, so
I watch Bush. Presently we hear the humpbacked steward's footsteps on
the deck above our heads, and, with a quick succession of little bumps,
half a dozen boiled potatoes come rolling down the stairs of the
companionway into the cabin. They are the forerunners of breakfast.
Bush watches the table, and I watch Bush more and more intently as
the steward brings in the eatables; and by the expression of Bush's face,
I judge whether it be worth while to get up or not. If he groans and
turns over to the wall, I know that it is only hash, and I echo his groan
and follow his example; but if he smiles, and gets up, I do likewise,
with the full assurance of fresh mutton-chops or rice curry and chicken.
After breakfast the Major smokes a cigarette and looks meditatively at
the barometer, the captain gets his old accordion and squeezes out the
Russian National Hymn, while Bush and I go on deck to inhale a few
breaths