That was the end of my connection with the _Ruapehu_. I had gained a considerable amount of experience in her, it had got me out of the old groove, and I had become reconciled to my lot. The worst of the business was the longer voyages, and the knowledge that in the near future our stay in London would be materially curtailed, as New Zealand was to be considered the home port. But with it all there was a fine sense of exhilaration. There was enough use to be made of canvas in order to get the best out of the ships--that reminded one of some of the best traditions of the sea--and we perpetuated so far as we could those of the old customs that would or could exist side by side with steam. The ships were well found and there was no stint of anything required to put them on a really first-class level. As, however, might have been anticipated in a new steam company, after some time it became necessary to take a more careful survey of what was really being done. Bidding adieu to my ship I now transferred my interest to the new ship _Kaikoura_. CHAPTER XI “She walked the waters like a thing of life.” [Illustration: N.Z.S.S. “KAIKOURA” (From a painting by Willie Fleming of Cape Town)] I suppose that all seamen have cherished a particular liking for some particular ship they have sailed in; a long association seems to establish a sympathy between the mind that controls and the dull steel that gives effect to the task required of it. Kipling had some such idea in his mind when he wrote “The Ship that found Herself,” and almost insensibly the idea is imbibed that the ship is a sentient thing whose behaviour can be accurately forecasted under any given conditions. I never had that feeling quite for the _Mexican_--my acquaintance was not long enough to permit it to grow into absolute confidence which it assuredly would have done had time been granted, but for my new ship it was altogether different. I took her twenty-three voyages round the world, and she never disappointed me, or failed to come up to expectation at any time. She could do anything that was reasonably asked of her, and I am vain enough to think she sulked when she lost the hand upon her that she had grown accustomed to, for she never did much afterwards. As it was put to me by a prominent official, “She never seemed to have a day’s luck after you left her.”