WHALING AND BEAR-HUNTING 167 



three in the morning are so different ! So the writer and the 

 mirthless waiter sit down again in the vast empty dining- 

 room and wait whilst "41 " gets into his clothes. . . . Now 

 we are ready an hour later than the end of above para- 

 graph, but still tea-less. My fishermen and interpreter 

 have been waiting under the palms in front of the hotel, 

 smoking cigarettes and talking quietly and with interest, 

 even at this dark hour of morning. We give them our 

 thermos flasks, with only cold coffee in them, and our pro- 

 visions for two days, in baskets, and with them we steal into 

 the night round the hotel gardens and terraces, trimmed 

 with tenantless wicker-work chairs, under the palms, pale 



in the faint moonlight, down the steps, over the cliffs with 

 care, through an iron gate, we must look like conspirators, 

 but we only feel sleepless ; down and down, till we come to 

 the bathing steps and dimly discern our boat and men rising 

 and falling in the grey foam. We embark with difficulty, 

 with our provisions, and row off. The moon in the west 

 breaks a little through the clouds and cheers us with its 

 broken reflections on the long swell. "41 " is in the stern, 

 the writer in the bow, four rowers and the interpreter 

 between us. 



We pass under the cliffs to the west of Funchal Bay, 

 rowing steadily with two long sweeps, two men to a sweep, 

 close to the surf on the rocks, and pass a blow-hole in the 



