At sea, the moment the sun rises, and when one feels in the humor of quitting his hot state-room and going on deck, the officer of the watch sings out in a voice that goes directly to the heart--"Forard there--wash decks!" Then commences an elemental war rivalling Noah's deluge. _That_ was caused by the pouring down of rain in drops--_thié_ by the out-pouring of full buckets. From the moment this flood commences one may draw back into his narrow shell, like an affrighted snail, and take a morning's nap:--the deck, for an hour to come, is no place for animals that are not web-footed.
Fore and aft the unhappy passenger finds no way of escaping the infliction of this purifying ceremony. Should he be driven aloft, there "to banquet on the morning," he were better reposing on a gridiron or sitting astride a handsaw. If below, there the steward has possession, sweeping, laying the breakfast table and making-up berths, and the air, a hundred times breathed over, rushes from the opening state-rooms threatening to suffocate him--he were better engulfed in the bosom of a stew-pan.
To stand, cold, wet, and uncomfortable upon the damp decks till the sun has dried both them and him is the only alternative. If after all the "holy stone" should come in play, he may then quietly jump over-board.
The evenings, however, amply compensate for the loss of the fine mornings. The air, free from the dust, floating particles and exhalations of the land, is perfectly transparent, and the sky of a richer blue. The stars seem nearer to you there; and the round moon pours her unclouded flood of light, down upon the sea, with an opulence and mellowness, of which those who have only seen moonlight, sleeping upon green hills, cities and forests, know nothing. On such nights, there cannot be a nobler, or prouder spectacle, as one stands upon the bows, than the lofty, shining pyramid of snow-white canvass which, rising majestically from the deck, lessens away, sail after sail, far into the sky--each sheet distended like a drum-head, yet finely rounded, and its towering summit, as the ship rises and falls upon the billows, waving like a tall poplar, swaying in the wind. In these hours of moonlit enchantment, while reclining at full length upon the deck, and gazing at the diminished point of the flag-staff, tracing devious labyrinths among the stars, the blood has danced quicker through my veins as I could feel the ship springing away beneath me like a fleet courser, and leaping from wave to wave over the sea. At such moments the mind cannot divest itself of the idea that the bounding ship is instinct with life--an animated creature, careering forward by its own volition. To this are united the musical sighing of the winds through the sails and rigging--the dashing of the sea and the sound of the rushing vessel through the water, which sparkles with phosphorescent light, as though sprinkled with silver dust.