Three days after the events related in the last chapter, the trade winds, which had escorted the _Pandora_ so well on her passage, died away, and left the vessel in a dead calm, till a snorting southerly breeze came over the ocean, and sent her careering along at her best pace. The wind which rattled through the rigging was cold and chilly, and made the ladies unpack their furs, and huddle round the stove. Few patronised the deck--the air was too keen and searching. It was a marvellous change from the sultry weather of the week before, when Alice Leyton had sat with Captain Lovell under the wheel-house, and most of the passengers felt it acutely. A huge purple bank, lined with silver, had risen upon the beam, and the sun assumed a watery and unnatural appearance. Mr Coffin, indifferent to everything but the welfare of the vessel, kept a look-out upon the poop, anxiously watching at intervals the ominous-looking cloud, which was gradually growing larger. With his cap drawn down closely over his eyes, his thick, bull-dog neck encircled by a red worsted muffler, a big quid stuck in his cheeks, and his rough, broad hands embedded in his trousers pockets, he was the model of a British seaman. But he was by no means morose or ill-tempered. Exceedingly shy and reserved, from ignorance of the ways and manners of society, he seldom commenced a conversation, but if any of the passengers were bold enough to speak to him, they found him unpolished, but kindly in disposition. Under his weather-beaten exterior he hid a warm, good heart, for Mr Coffin had a soul of honour, and a mean or cowardly action would have been utterly beneath him. ‘Good-morning; nice day this, isn’t it?’ remarked Godfrey Harland. ‘Yes, sir,’ replied the chief officer; ‘but I am afraid we are going to have a blow. I don’t like the looks of it.’ ‘It looks dirty to windward, I must say. Do you think there is mischief in that bank?’ ‘I am sure there is,’ said Coffin; ‘we shall have to shorten down before daybreak, but it won’t be much. The glass is falling, too, sir, and perhaps you know the old saying,--’ “When the glass falls low, prepare for a blow, When the glass rises high, let all your kites fly.” But we shall be prepared. I have the hands up at the fore and main reefing the tackles and spilling lines, and the chain tacks and double sheets are on.’ ‘What are they doing to your main-topgallant parcell?’ inquired Harland, looking up aloft at the sailors at work. ‘Well, they are lacing on some new leather parcelling,’ replied the mate solemnly, stroking his chin. ‘The old stuff don’t let the yard travel quick enough for my liking. But, if I’m not very much mistaken, this is not your first voyage, sir,’ he continued, fixing his keen eyes upon Harland’s face. ‘Oh, no,’ replied the other lightly; ‘I have often been on the briny. I owned a yacht in New York once--an eighty-tonner--and all my nautical knowledge was learned aboard her.’