158 MEMOIR OF FLEEMING JENKIN 



VI 



And here, to make an end, are a few random bits 

 about the cruise to Pernambuco : 



* Plymouth, June 21, 1873. I have been down to 

 the seashore and smelt the salt sea and like it ; 

 and I have seen the Hooper pointing her great bow 

 sea-ward, while light smoke rises from her funnels, 

 telling that the fires are being lighted ; and sorry 

 as I am to be without you, something inside me 

 answers to the call to be off and doing. 



4 Lalla RooJeh, Plymouth, June 22. We have 

 been a little cruise in the yacht over to the Eddy- 

 stone lighthouse, and my sea-legs seem very well 

 on. Strange how alike all these starts are first 

 on shore, steaming hot days with a smell of bone- 

 dust and tar and salt water ; then the little puffing 

 panting steam-launch that bustles out across a 

 port with green woody sides, little yachts sliding 

 about, men-of-war training-ships, and then a great 

 big black hulk of a thing with a mass of smaller 

 vessels sticking to it like parasites ; and that is 

 one's home being coaled. Then comes the Cham- 

 pagne lunch where every one says all that is polite 

 to every one else, and then the uncertainty when 

 to start. So far as we know now, we are to start to- 

 morrow morning at daybreak ; letters that come 

 later are to be sent to Pernambuco by first mail. 



