53 



CHAPTER III. 



VOYAGE, AND SIX MONTHS AT CAPE TOWN. 



The Carnatic sailed from Portsmouth, on the 12th of July, and 

 entered Table Bay on the 17th of September. The following- 

 extracts, taken from a journal kept by Mr. Harvey during the 

 voyage, and addressed to his sister, may be interesting to the 

 reader as characteristic of his mind during this period. 



July 23rd. After breakfast we were amused with the first 

 shoal of porpoises we have yet seen. " Happy living things," 

 as dear Coleridge would say ; and happy indeed they looked, 

 bounding from wave to wave with prodigious activity. They 

 compare them to pigs, but I never saw such graceful joyousness 

 in pigs in my life. They came from leeward, and passed off to 

 windward. If what sailors say be true, this ought to betoken a 

 change of wind, for they are said to come from the direction in 

 which the wind is about to spring up. Mother Carey's chickens 

 (Procellaria pelagica) were flying about us many times to-day, 

 and we have seen them on two or three days before, though I 

 believe I forgot to notice them. Poor birds! But I believe it is 

 false sentiment to pity them, for doubtless they are best fitted 

 by Providence for the stormy life they lead ; but, for my part, I 

 would not be a Mother Carey. 



July 21th. Lat. 36° 30' N., long. 17° 7 W. The weather 

 begins to grow ambrosial ; the seas are blue, the skies clear, or 

 thinly clothed in fleecy clouds, and we move along, not very 

 rapidly, but steadily and smoothly. On the whole, we are 

 more resigned to the sea. This morning the thermometer was 

 70° in my cabin, and fell not during the day. I bask, and say 

 nothing, for I have made up my mind to enjoy heat as much as 

 possible, for how else can I be contented in my new life, if I 



