FROM EDINBURGH TO THE ANTARCTIC £9 
in at the scuppers, filling the waist with glittering liquid 
moonlight. 
Willie is of the sea, as his parents were before him, and 
has lived in every corner of the world, and has served in 
many trades. Like five sailors out of every ten, he ran 
away to sea when he was a boy. Then he took to line 
and herring fishing, travelled with Wombwell's menagerie, 
sailed in the nitre trade till he grew tired of the Horn, 
went whaling to the Arctic, tired of that, carried golf clubs 
at Carnoustie links, netted salmon in the Tay, with 
every now and then a spell at the deep sea. He came 
on this trip almost by accident, — one of these chances 
that give a sailor's life its zest. Having scraped together 
a few pounds, he left his quiet fishing village and went to 
Glasgow to take ship to any part of the world on any ship 
that might be going. Fortunately his friend, the station- 
master at Carnoustie, persuaded him to buy a return 
ticket, and when he* had spent the last of his cash with 
some old sea-cronies that he fell in with in Glasgow, he 
was still able to get back to Dundee instead of being 
Shanghaied from some boarding-house. At Dundee he 
found the Balaena in the dry dock fitting out for the 
Antarctic, and gaily danced across the gangway plank at 
the risk of his neck, and promised to sign articles ; and 
right glad we all are he did so, for we need such jovial 
spirits on board to keep things going cheerily. Whilst 
yarning away to each other, he used a number of ex- 
pressions that had a slightly French sound about them, 
so I asked him where he picked them up, and to my 
surprise he told me that, In addition to his other ad- 
