r of
thin, insistent rain; rain that by the keenness of it ought to have
been snow or sleet. The sea around was shrouded in mist, and breaking
day, coming in with a cold, treacherous half-light, added to the
illusion that made the horizon seem scarcely a length away. The barque
was labouring unsteadily, with a long westerly swell--the ghost of the
Cape Horn 'greybeards '--running under her in oily ridges.

It needed but a bite of freshening wind to rouse the sea; at the lash
of a sudden gale the 'greybeards' would be at us again--whelming and
sweeping. Even in quiet mood they were loath to let us go north, and
we jarred and rattled, rolled, lurched, and wallowed as they hove at
us. Heave as they did, we were still able to make way on our course,
standing with yards in to the quartering wind and all plain sail on her.

Thick weather! The horizon closed to us at a length or so ahead. But
she was moving slowly, four knots at the most, and we were well out of
the track of ships! Oh, it was all right--all right; and aft there the
Mate leaned over the poop rail with his arms squared and his head
nodding--now and then!

As the light grew, it seemed to bring intenser cold. Jackets were not
enough; we donned coats and oilskins and stamped and stamped on the
foredeck, yawning and muttering and wishing it was five o'clock and the
'doctor' ready with the blessed coffee: the coffee that would make men
of us; vile 'hogwash' that a convict would turn his face at, but what
seemed nectar to us at daybreak, down there in fifty-five!

By one bell the mist had grown denser, and the Mate sung out sudden and
angrily for the foghorn to be sounded.

"Three blasts, d'ye 'ear," said the bo'sun, passing the horn up to
Dago, the look-out. "_Uno! ... Doo! ... Tray!_" (Three fingers held
up.) ... "_Tray_, ye burnt scorpion! ... An' see that ye sounds 'em
proper, or I'll come up there an' hide th' soul-case out o' ye! ...
(Cow-punchin' hoodlum! Good job I knows 'is bloomin' lingo!)"

Now we had a tune to our early rising, a doleful tune, a tune set to
the deepening mist, the heaving sea, at dismal break of day. _R-r-ah!
... R-r-ah! Ra!_ was the way it ran; a mournful bar, with windy gasps
here and there, for Dago Joe was more accustomed to a cowhorn.

"A horn," said Welsh John suddenly. "Did 'oo hear it?"

No one had heard. We were gathered round the galley door, all talking,
all telling the 'doctor' the best way to light a f