880 RESIGNATION TO OUR ILL-FATE. 



best men! Then, bound from there to Hobartown, 

 we had the wind smack in our teeth for two weeks, 

 when, with a favorable breeze, we should have per- 

 formed the run in three or four daj'S. Our ill-success 

 in whaling to the southward, and on our visit to the 

 Abrolhas', is too glaring to need particularization. 

 Our passage to Mauritius was but a drawl, from the 

 lightness of the winds. In doubling the Cape we were 

 Jacksoned a week — at the line the same ill-fortune 

 attended us. Now we have lost the northeast trades 

 a week before we ought to. Add to these our other 

 malexperiences, such as men falling from aloft, boats 

 capsized and stoven, a sperm whale's head lost. 

 And, to crown all, here we are, bound on to the 

 North American coast in the worst month of the 

 year, with an unremunerative voyage. Now, in the 

 name of reason ! how any one can expect good luck 

 in the face of this category I cannot understand : as 

 for myself, I cannot." And, with a gloomy shake 

 of the head, the speaker concluded, folded his arms 

 across his breast, and seemed resigned to the hard 

 fate he had depicted for himself. His manner, how- 

 ever, was such as to convince the most casual ob- 

 server that his was a spirit to combat manfully what- 

 ever further misfortunes might befall us, through 

 accident or any other cause. The whole bearing of 

 the man, in fact, showed a perfect confidence in the 

 ability of himself and his shipmates to resist every 

 tide of evil the great Neptune might send. His 

 enumeration of our ill-successes heretofore made his 

 aro-nraent almost unanswerable; but still I essayed 

 to administer some consolation by quoting the old 

 adage, " it is always darkest before day," and adding 



