rried
aloft, and then tumbled, with its living contents, down-- down-- we
could not tell where!

What a shock it gave me, that tumble! I lay for some seconds quite
stunned. My first impulse, when I recovered a little, was bitterly to
bewail my condition, and to reproach him who had brought me into it.

"Oh that I had been content with my kwas and my shtshee! Oh that I had
never left the kitchen! that I had never ventured forth with a reckless
companion, who would, I believe, play at hide and seek with a cat, or
nibble at the pocket of a rat-catcher!"

My tone was, I knew, both peevish and provoking; and many a brown rat,
in the position of my companion, would have stopped my doleful squeaking
at once by giving me something to squeak for. But Whiskerandos, whatever
were his faults, was above that mean one of quarrelling with those who
found them out, or attempting to screen and defend them.

"Ratto, I am sorry that I have led you into trouble," said he. "I wish
that I could suffer alone for my self-will and imprudence. But since no
regrets can recall the past, let us not make our miseries greater by
reproaches and dissension between those who may soon die, as they have
lived, together."

His mildness quite overcame any feeling of bitterness in my heart;
and hope revived as some time elapsed without fresh cause for alarm
occurring.

"I wonder where we are!" exclaimed I, shaking myself into a more easy
position.

"I fancy that I hear the creaking of a windlass!" cried Whiskerandos.

"And the flapping of canvass!" added I. "And I smell tar."

"A strong odour of tar! Depend upon it, we are down in the hold of a
ship!"

"Ha! that's the ripple of water! she moves,-- she moves!"

We were again afloat on the waters!

CHAPTER XIX.

A STORM AND ITS CONSEQUENCES.

"Farewell St. Petersburg, stately city! with thy flat green roofs, and
star-spangled domes! Farewell merry-hearted, sandy-haired Russians,
bearded Tartars, gay Circassians,-- never may we behold you again!
Farewell kwas and shtshee, and all the luxuries for too brief a time
enjoyed! Where are we going now,-- where!"

Such were the complaints which I was wont to pour out during the long
tedious voyage which succeeded. Whiskerandos never grumbled, it was not
in his nature; he quietly fed on his corn without uttering one
melancholy word: but I suspected that he, like myself, associated
sailors with rat pies; and to hear any one approach the hold,