I agreed that if the _Nancy_ had not been going direct to
Portsmouth, we should do well to leave her at Newcastle, and try to make
our way south on board some other vessel. Although we went, I believe,
much out of our proper course, we at last entered the Tyne. Soon after
we brought up, several curiously-shaped boats, called kreels, came
alongside, containing eight tubs, each holding a chaldron; these tubs
being hoisted on board, their bottoms were opened and the coals fell
into the hold.

The kreels, which were oval in shape, were propelled by a long oar or
pole on each side, worked by a man who walked along the gunwale from the
bow to the stern, pressing the upper end with his shoulder while the
lower touched the ground. Another man stood in the stern with a similar
long oar to steer.

The crews were fine hardy fellows, known as kreelmen. I was astonished
to hear them call each other bullies, till I found that the term
signified "brothers." So bully Saunders meant brother Saunders.

Jim and I had had the sense to put on our working clothes, which was
fortunate, as before long, with the coal-dust flying about, we were as
black as negroes, but as everything and all on board were coloured with
the same brush, we did not mind that.

With the help of the kreelmen the _Nancy_ was soon loaded, and we again
sailed for the southward. Matters did not improve. The captain, having
abstained from liquor while on shore, recompensed himself by taking a
double allowance, and became proportionably morose and ill-tempered,
never speaking civilly to me, and often passing a whole day without
exchanging a word with his poor mate; and when he did open his mouth it
was to abuse. The brig, though tolerably tight when light, now that she
had a full cargo, as soon as a sea got up began to leak considerably, so
that each watch had to pump for an hour to keep the water under. Jim
and I took our turns without being ordered, but though accustomed to the
exercise, it was hard work. When we cried "Spell ho!" for others to
take our places, the captain shouted, "You began to pump for your own
pleasure, now you shall go on for mine, you young rascals!" The men,
however, though they at first laughed, having more humanity than the
skipper, soon relieved us.

This was the third day after we sailed, when the wind shifting to the
south-west, and then to the south, we stood away to the eastward in
order to double the North Foreland. After s