that these should be cooked very soft, and great
was his wrath when they came back hard as stones. Upon investigation
it proved that they were already hard-boiled when bought. The cable
was not yet secured when these applicants crowded to the gangway,
brandishing their certificates, and seeking each to be first on deck.
The captain, who had not left the bridge, leaned over the rail,
watching the excited and shouting crowd scrambling one over another,
and clambering from boat to boat, which were bobbing and chafing up
and down, rubbing sides, and spattering the water that was squeezed
and squirted between them. The scene was familiar to him, for he was
an old China cruiser, only renewing his acquaintance. At length,
turning to me, he commented, "There you have the regular China smell;
you will find it wherever you go." And I did; but how describe it--and
why should I?

At this time the Japanese had conceded two more treaty ports, in the
Inland Sea--Osaka and Kobe; and as the formal opening was fixed for
the beginning of the new year--1868--most of the squadron had already
gone north. We therefore found in Hong Kong only a single vessel, the
_Monocacy_, an iron double-ender; a class which had its beginning in
the then recent War of Secession, and disappeared with it. Some six
weeks before she had passed through a furious typhoon, running into
the centre of it; or, more accurately, I fancy, having the centre pass
over her. Perhaps it may not be a matter of knowledge to all readers
that for these hurricanes, as for many other heavy gales, the term
cyclone is exact; that the wind does actually blow round a circle, but
one of so great circumference that at each several point it seems to
follow a straight line. Vessels on opposite sides of the circle thus
have the wind from opposite directions. In the centre there is usually
a calm space, of diameter proportioned to that of the general
disturbance. As the whole storm body has an onward movement, this
centre, calm or gusty as to wind, but confused and tumultuous as to
wave, progresses with it; and a vessel which is so unhappy as to be
overtaken finds herself, after a period of helpless tossing by
conflicting seas, again subjected to the full fury of the wind, but
from the quarter opposite to that which has already tried her.
Although at our arrival the _Monocacy_ had been fully repaired, and
was about to follow the other vessels, her officers naturally were
still full of an ad