her voice. I was spell-bound when I looked at her, and stark
staring mad when she looked at me! O lustrous black eyes!--O
glossy night-black ringlets!--O lips!--O dainty frocks of white
muslin!--O tiny kid slippers!--though old and gouty, Gahagan sees
you still! I recollect, off Ascension, she looked at me in her
particular way one day at dinner, just as I happened to be blowing
on a piece of scalding hot green fat. I was stupefied at once--I
thrust the entire morsel (about half a pound) into my mouth. I
made no attempt to swallow, or to masticate it, but left it there
for many minutes, burning, burning! I had no skin to my palate for
seven weeks after, and lived on rice-water during the rest of the
voyage. The anecdote is trivial, but it shows the power of Julia
Jowler over me.

The writers of marine novels have so exhausted the subject of
storms, shipwrecks, mutinies, engagements, sea-sickness, and so
forth, that (although I have experienced each of these in many
varieties) I think it quite unnecessary to recount such trifling
adventures; suffice it to say, that during our five months' trajet,
my mad passion for Julia daily increased; so did the captain's and
the surgeon's; so did Colonel Lilywhite's; so did the doctor's, the
mate's--that of most part of the passengers, and a considerable
number of the crew. For myself, I swore--ensign as I was--I would
win her for my wife; I vowed that I would make her glorious with my
sword--that as soon as I had made a favourable impression on my
commanding officer (which I did not doubt to create), I would lay
open to him the state of my affections, and demand his daughter's
hand. With such sentimental outpourings did our voyage continue
and conclude.