have got her pretty well in her fore and aft trim. Now, what about
your weights?"

I told him I had managed to keep the weight sufficiently well up,
as I thought, one-third of the whole being in the upper part "above
the beams," as the technical expression has it. He whistled
"Phew!" scrutinizing me from head to foot. A sort of smiling
vexation was visible on his ruddy face.

"Well, we shall have a lively time of it this passage, I bet," he
said.

He knew. It turned out he had been chief mate of her for the two
preceding voyages; and I was already familiar with his handwriting
in the old log-books I had been perusing in my cabin with a natural
curiosity, looking up the records of my new ship's luck, of her
behaviour, of the good times she had had, and of the troubles she
had escaped.

He was right in his prophecy. On our passage from Amsterdam to
Samarang with a general cargo, of which, alas! only one-third in
weight was stowed "above the beams," we had a lively time of it.
It was lively, but not joyful. There was not even a single moment
of comfort in it, because no seaman can feel comfortable in body or
mind when he has made his ship uneasy.

To travel along with a cranky ship for ninety days or so is no
doubt a nerve-trying experience; but in this case what was wrong
with our craft was this: that by my system of loading she had been
made much too stable.