The Captain's u Ludcy Penny " 71 



seven or eight hundred, and some of great magni- 

 tude. During the afternoon a little snow bunting 

 was caught, which, however, did not survive its 

 capture long. It had evidently come from some 

 distance, and was quite exhausted. 



Our captain always carries about with him what 

 he calls a " lucky penny," one of those huge coins 

 in circulation in the reign of George III. With 

 this, from the first thing in the morning until the 

 last thing at night, whether on deck or below, he is 

 always anxious to toss with the doctor for the best 

 of five successive guesses. It is most amusing to 

 watch the cunning manner in which our worthy 

 skipper puts his coin down, and the delight beam- 

 ing on his jolly countenance when he succeeds in 

 winning. As a rule they toss for nothing but their 

 own amusement, but in the evening it is generally 

 for who shall fetch the plates, &c, for our supper, 

 the water for our toddy, or the glasses for our grog. 

 In the evening they amuse themselves with cards, 

 playing rather a noisy game, peculiar, I presume, to 

 whalers, called " Scratch the ten," whose particular 

 feature appears to be a grand fight as to which shall 

 obtain possession of the ten of trumps. 



I remained up, watching the sun as it slowly 

 disappeared below the N".W. horizon, sinking gra- 

 dually and majestically. It was past ten before its 

 upper limb was out of sight, but such a short dis- 

 tance was it below the horizon that it was really 



