With midnight came squally weather, with thunder and red flashes of lightning, against which, "instant seen and instant lost," rose the black outline of the heavy waves, serrated like the teeth of a saw; but when day came in, the _Amethyst_ was standing in for the Bay of Rio de Janeiro, under full sail, with a steady breeze from the sea. Long ere this, the watch on deck had been busy getting the cables out of the tier, laying them in French-fake on the deck, a peculiar method adopted to let them run out freely, precluding all danger of the links getting foul. They were then bent to the anchors, which were hoisted over the bows and hung by the ring ready for use. The flag of the Royal Naval Reserve was now run up in a round ball to the gaff, where it was shaken loose, and then "the blessed bit o' bunting," as Joe Grummet admiringly and affectionately called it, floated gallantly on the breeze. By noon Captain Talbot gave the order to shorten sail; the courses were hauled up; the warm breeze swept through the open rigging; the anchor was let go--the cable swept with a roar through the hawse-hole, and the ship rode at her moorings, in eight fathoms water, while the hands and apprentices went aloft to furl everything fore and aft. Around was now the noble bay of Rio, studded by fully eighty islets, with the city and all its shipping in the foreground; and the high range of beautiful mountains, clothed with wood to their summits, called the Corcovado, that bound its western plain, in the background. Along the beach lies the main street, called the Rua Dirieta, from which all the others branch off and form a city of palaces, for such it is; and high over all its edifices, conspicuous on a hill that juts into the sea between it and the Praya de Flamingo, towers Nossa Senhora da Gloria, the greatest of the sixty churches in Rio, where eternal spring and summer reign together. But we do not mean to "do Guide Book," and dwell on the beauties and wonders of Rio de Janeiro; neither do we mean to linger on the _debût_ of Derval or his probationary life as a sailor, for we have much to relate of his future career. Suffice it now, that "bulk" was soon broken on board the _Amethyst_; the cargo started and sent ashore, to be replaced by another for Van Dieman's Land, and by the labour of slaves, who in Rio are made veritable beasts of burden, and are to be seen with iron collars about their necks, and often with masks of tin, that conceal the lower portion of their faces and are secured behind by a common padlock; and the last day of March saw the _Amethyst_ standing out of the bay, with a land breeze, under a press of sail, once more to plough the world of waters.