The captain is a delightful fellow,with a very charming young wife.There is only one child (a great comfort),a capital cook,and universal civility and quietness.It is like a private house compared to a railway hotel.Six of the passengers are invalids,more or less.Mr.Porter,over-worked,going home for health to Ireland;two men,both with delicate chests,and one poor young fellow from Capetown in a consumption,who,I fear,will not outlive the voyage.The doctor is very civil,and very kind to the sick;but I stick to the cook,and am quite greedy over the good fare,after the atrocious food of the Cape.Said cook is a Portuguese,a distinguished artist,and a great bird-fancier.One can wander all over the ship here,instead of being a prisoner on the poop;and I even have paid my footing on the forecastle.S-clambers up like a lively youngster.You may fancy what the weather is,that I have only closed my cabin-window once during half of a very damp night;but no one else is so airy.The little goat was as rejoiced to be afloat again as her mistress,and is a regular pet on board,with the run of the quarter-deck.She still gives milk -a perfect Amalthaea.The butcher,who has the care of her,cockers her up with dainties,and she begs biscuit of the cook.I pay nothing for her fare.M-'s tortoises are in my cabin,and seem very happy.Poor Mr.Porter is very sick,and so are the two or three coloured passengers,who won't 'make an effort'at all.Mrs.H-(the captain's wife),a young Cape lady,and I are the only 'female ladies'of the party.The other day we saw a shoal of porpoises,amounting to many hundreds,if not some thousands,who came frisking round the ship.When we first saw them they looked like a line of breakers;they made such a splash,and they jumped right out of the water three feet in height,and ten or twelve in distance,glittering green and bronze in the sun.
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