A NIGHT'S PEEIL. 131 



would serve our turn. Such a large and straggling 

 party was not got together and re-embarked without 

 difficulty ; and the upshot of all Avas that, by the 

 time we were under way homewards, it was well 

 on in the evening. This gave us little uneasiness ; 

 the nights were clear, the breeze was generally steady, 

 and as the land lay pretty well astern, the only diffi- 

 culty that occurred to me was concerning the orderly 

 behaviour of some of the men, who had taken too 

 much wine to be quite manageable. 



As it concerns our subsequent adventure, I may as 

 well say that none of the uproarious ones were on 

 board the Wave. They none of them would patronise 

 a craft (so they said) which was commanded by such 

 a long-faced skipper. So Hamilton and myself were 

 the complement returning, as we had been coming. 

 He was as sober as a judge, and just as much dis- 

 posed as ever to be "handy Billy," or, in common 

 language, to do a turn of work wherever he might 

 be useful. I should think that we must have num- 

 bered, in all, at least twenty boats. It did not seem 

 xmlikely that some of them might fall on board of 

 each other, as they were crowded very thickly, and 

 some of them kept poor watch. Some of the steers- 

 men were too jolly to be careful, and the girls did 

 not by any means call them to order. It is almost 

 a peculiarity of colonial girls to be without fear. 

 Perhaps it is because they see so much of change, 

 that few things strike them as strange, and it is 



