ly I ain't
apt to be very cheerful, not for a while yet."

Say, that dope of Vee's about gettin' the feel of the boat was a good
hunch. Once you get it in your legs the soggy feelin' under your vest
begins to let up. Also your head clears. Why, inside of half an hour
I'm steppin' out brisk with my chin up, breathin' in great chunks of
salt air and meetin' that heave of the deck as natural as if I'd walked
on rubber pavements all my life. After that, whenever I got to havin'
any of them up and down sensations in the plumbin' department, I dashed
for the open air and walked it down.

Lucky I could, too; for about Friday afternoon we ran into some weather
that was the real thing. It had been cloudy most of the mornin', with
the wind makin' up, and around three o'clock there was whitecaps as far
as you could see. Nothin' monotonous or reg'lar about the motion of
the _Agnes_ then. She'd lift up on one of them big waves like she was
stretchin' her neck to see over the top; then, as it rolled under her,
she'd tip to one side until it looked like she was tryin' to spill us,
and she'd slide down into a soapsudsy hollow until she met a solid wall
of green water.

"This is what we generally get off Hatteras," says Vee, who has shown
up in a green oiled silk outfit and has joined me in a sheltered spot
under the bridge. "Isn't it perfectly gorgeous?"

"It's all right for once," says I, "providin' it don't last too long.
Everyone below enjoyin' it, are they?"

"Oh, Auntie's been in her berth for hours," says Vee. "She never takes
any chances. But Mrs. Mumford tried to sit up and crochet. Helma's
trying to take care of her, and she can hardly hold her head up. They
are both quite sure they're going to die at once. You should hear them
taking on."

"How is it this don't get you, too?" says I.

"I've always been a good sailor," says Vee. "And, anyway, a storm is
too thrilling to waste the time being seasick. I always want to stay
up around, too, and repeat that little verse of Kipling's. You know--

'When the cabin portholes are dark and green,
Because of the seas outside,
When the ship goes wop with a wiggle between,
And the cook falls into the soup tureen,
And the trunks begin to slide--'

Doesn't that just describe it, though--that 'wop with a wiggle
between'?"

"As good as a thousand feet of film," says I. "Kip must have had some
of this fun himself. Here comes a wop for us. There!