"I'm willin' to allow," observed he, "that a trip round the Horn ain't
like a day's cruise in the Solent--all pleasuring; but I've knowed ships
to come round under r'yal stunsails, and that more than once. The place
is bad enough; but, like many another thing, not so black as it's
painted. It's got a bad name, and that, we know, sticks to a place or
to a body through thick and thin. I've been round five times, twice
outward-bound and three times homeward, and we always had plenty of
wind; but only once did I round it in a reg'lar gale, and then, had the
_Lily_ been there, I'll lay my grog for the rest of the v'yage she'd
have made better weather of it than the old barkie I was aboard of.
It's risky, I know; but so's the whole trip, for that matter, though, so
far, by what I've seen of the little craft, I'd as lieve be aboard _her_
in a gale of wind as I would be in e'er a ship that ever was launched.
She's cramped for room, and when you've said that you've said all as any
man can say ag'in her. Besides, see how 'twill shorten the v'yage.
Once round the Horn and you're there, as you may say, or next door to
it. And then, there's `Magellan;' if, when we get down about there,
things don't look promising for a trip round outside of everything, ram
her through the Straits. I've been through 'em once, and an ugly enough
passage it was too, blowing a whole gale; but there's _thousands_ of
places where the _Lily_ would lie as snug as if she was in dock, but
where a large ship dursen't venture for her life."

I yielded, as I generally did in such matters, to Bob's judgment; and it
was settled that the _Water Lily_ should brave Cape Horn with all its
perils. On the fourth day of our stay at Funchal we filled up our
water-tank, made a few additions to our stores (among others, a small
stock of the famous wine produced by the island); and towards evening
stood out to sea again, with our main-boom well garnished with bunches
of bananas and nets of various kinds of fruits; the wind at the time
being light, from about east-south-east, with a fine settled look about
the weather. This lasted us for four days, and ran us fairly into the
"trades," and on the third day following, just as the sun was dipping
beneath the horizon, we sighted Saint Antonio, the westernmost of the
Cape Verde Islands.

The "trades" were blowing very moderately as it happened, and the
weather was as fine as heart could wish, with a nearly full moon into