128 TEE CRUISE OF THE "CACHALOT." 



CHAPTEE XI. 



ROUND THE COCOS AND SEYCHELLES. 



Hitherto, with the exception of a couple of gales in the 

 North and South Atlantic, we had been singularly 

 fortunate in our weather. It does happen so sometimes. 



I remember once making a round voyage from 

 Cardiff to Hong Kong and the Philippines, back to 

 London, in ten months, and during the whole of that 

 time we did not have a downright gale. The worst 

 weather we encountered was between Beachy Head and 

 Portland, going round from London to Cardiff. 



And I once spoke the barque Lutterworth, a com- 

 panion ship to us from Portland, Oregon to Falmouth, 

 whose mate informed me that they carried their royals 

 from port to port without ever furling them once, 

 except to shift the suit of sails. But now a change 

 was evidently imminent. Of course, we forward had no 

 access to the barometer ; not that we should have under- 

 stood its indications if we had seen it, but we all knew 

 that something was going to be radically wrong with the 

 weather. For instead of the lovely blue of the sky we had 

 been so long accustomed to by day and night, a nasty, 

 greasy shade had come over the heavens, which, reflected 

 in the sea, made that look dirty and stale also. That 



