The passage out was uneventful, but when we got to Algoa Bay we had some time to spend there. The ship was in beautiful order, even to the satisfaction of the skipper, who took a delight in trying to find out something amiss out of sheer mischief and for the love of tormenting me. Not that I minded in the least--it was good training--but for some reason or other it came to the front that there were one or two anchors and chains on the bottom in the vicinity of where we were anchored, and Garrett told me to find them and pick them up. I started to sweep and soon got fast to something heavy, and the work of recovery began. I picked up an anchor and chain, claimed as belonging to one of the Castle line, another anchor and chain, and also heavy moorings laid down for the company’s ships some years before. On the last day I was engaged in this operation, Garrett took Merritt on shore to the races, leaving me with a pious adjuration to be sure not to kill any one. It’s rather a mercy we had no accident, for we were dealing with heavy weights with makeshift gear. However, it was done, though when we got home the skipper was asked his reason for picking up the company’s moorings. There is no doubt, however, that it was a good piece of work, for it cleared a large space of the best anchoring ground; they were moorings that would have held a liner of today, but the place was not suitable for them. On the passage home we called at St. Helena, and as there was some spare room in the afterhold, we took in a great number of casks of whale oil for Southampton. They were old and leaky and made an awful mess of my beautifully clean teak deck before we could stow them in the after lower hold. I had grave misgivings about them from the first, but had to do as I was told. When we got off Ushant there was a heavy beam sea and the ship rolled badly, with the result that they all collapsed and not a single cask was landed. It took days to clean the hold, and there had to be an extension of protest and all sorts of trouble to get clear of the liability for loss, and to put it on the shoulders of the insurance people.