The scene on deck in the early morning was always interesting. All hands
were roused before six and turned on to the pumps, for the ship was
leaking considerably. Normally, the well showed about ten inches of water
when the ship was dry. Before pumping, the sinker would show anything
over two feet. The ship was generally dry after an hour to an hour and a
half's pumping, and by that time we had had quite enough of it. As soon
as the officer of the watch had given the order, "Vast pumping," the
first thing to do was to strip, and the deck was dotted with men trying
to get the maximum amount of water from the sea in a small bucket let
down on a line from the moving ship. First efforts in this direction
would have been amusing had it not been for the caustic eye of the 'Mate'
on the bridge. If the reader ever gets the chance to try the experiment,
especially in a swell, he will soon find himself with neither bucket nor
water. The poor Mate was annoyed by the loss of his buckets.

Everybody was working very hard during these days; shifting coal, reefing
and furling sail aloft, hauling on the ropes on deck, together with
magnetic and meteorological observations, tow-netting, collecting and
making skins and so forth. During the first weeks there was more cargo
stowing and paintwork than at other times, otherwise the work ran in
very much the same lines all the way out--a period of nearly five months.
On July 1 we were overhauled by the only ship we ever saw, so far as I
can remember, during all that time, the Inverclyde, a barque out from
Glasgow to Buenos Ayres. It was an oily, calm day with a sea like glass,
and she looked, as Wilson quoted, "like a painted ship upon a painted
ocean," as she lay with all sail set.

We picked up the N.E. Trade two days later, being then north of the Cape
Verde Islands (lat. 22° 28´ N., long. 23° 5´ W. at noon). It was a