OF AN

AFRICAN CRUISER.




CHAPTER I.

Departure--Mother Carey's Chickens--The Gulf stream--Rapid Progress--The
French Admiral's Cook--Nautical Musicians--The Sick Man--The Burial at
Sea--Arrival at the Canaries--Santa Cruz--Love and Crime--Island of Grand
Canary--Troglodytes near Las Palmas.


_June_ 5,1843.--Towed by the steamer Hercules, we go down the harbor of
New York, at 7 o'clock A.M. It is the fourth time the ship has moved,
since she was launched from the Navy Yard at Portsmouth. Her first
experience of the ocean was a rough one; she was caught in a wintry gale
from the north-east, dismasted, and towed back into Portsmouth harbor,
within three days after her departure. The second move brought us to New
York; the third, from the Navy Yard into the North river; and the fourth
will probably bring us to an anchorage off Sandy Hook. After a hard winter
of four months, in New Hampshire, we go to broil on the coast of Africa,
with ice enough in our blood to keep us comfortably cool for six months at
least.

At 10 A.M. the steamer cast off, and we anchored inside of Sandy Hook; at
12 Meridian, hoisted the broad pennant of Commodore Perry, and saluted it