An exquisitely wrought lamp of Benares brass—it had once graced a viceroy’s mansion in Calcutta—shed its soft light on the marble-topped center table. The captain’s compass affixed to the ceiling silently indicated the vessel’s course, and a number of fine geraniums which ornamented the wheel-house windows in warm weather now occupied a rack about the inside of the skylight. The ends of the room were occupied by two cozy sofas, with lockers underneath; one containing old copies of “Harper’s” and “Scribner’s,” while a liberal supply of ale, beer, and similar comforts filled the other. Upon the walls, handsomely finished in panels of natural woods, were a brace of revolvers and several glittering swords and cutlasses belonging to the captain,—excellent weapons to have on a ship far removed from all civil law for months at a time. The floor was of Oregon pine, beautifully oiled and polished. Contrary to custom, it was on this voyage covered by a carpet that the steward had put down soon after leaving port, “so as the passengers wouldn’t break their necks when she got to rolling off Cape Horn.” Nearly all the way from New York to the Falklands the weather had been glorious, and the ship stood up like a church in the few squalls that were encountered; but now the young men began to think the steward had known what he was about when that carpet was laid. Walking or even sitting still had become an accomplishment, so Hartley brought out the fifth volume of “Les Miserables,” while Wilbur produced one of the numerous books he had provided. With chair-backs to the table, and feet braced against the sofas, they defied the elements temporarily and read on—to the accompaniment of groaning timbers, an occasional crash from the steward’s pantry, and the muffled roaring of the gale without. The storm gained strength as the night advanced. While the mizzen topsail was being furled, bo’s’un Merrell went forward under the forecastle deck to put additional lashings on several casks of provisions stowed in the vicinity. He was assisted by two foremast hands, and the trio had just secured a barrel of flour when the ship was struck by a heavy sea, and gave a vicious roll that threw all three men against a water-butt standing near. The sailors gained their feet uninjured, but before the stunned bo’s’un could recover himself, a half-filled cask of beef broke loose and was hurled through space as though shot from a cannon. With a cry of warning, the two seamen stumbled out of the way, but before Merrell could escape he was felled like an ox, and his lantern smashed to fragments. The motion in that extreme forward part of the ship was very great, and the cask soon took another dive in a different direction; when the men, guided by the groans of the injured bo’s’un, groped their way to where he lay and contrived to drag him behind the hatch-coaming. He was able to sit up, and gasped out “Call the mate, Jack; I’ve got a bad hurt.”