When the area of sail had been reduced to the limit of safety, we had a clearer view fore and aft, and I had more leisure to listen to the wind-music in the shrouds, to observe the graver aspect of the sea, and to be influenced by unspeakable impressions. What a power this invisible element, which had stirred the sea to madness, was! If I raised my head above the bulwarks, it filled my eyes with tears, tore at my hair, drove up my nostrils with such force as to make me gasp. It flew up our trousers, and under our oilskin jackets, and inflated us until we resembled the plumpest effigies conceivable. In the height of the turmoil, while trying to control my ideas, I was startled by the penetrating voice of Waters singing in my ear. ‘Now, my young pudding-faced joker, why are you standing here with your mouth wide open? Get a swab, you monkey, and swab up this poop, or I’ll jump down your--throat. Look alive now, you sweet-scented son of a sea-cook!’ That first voyage of mine was certainly a remarkable one, were it only for the new-fangled vocabulary I was constantly hearing. Every sentence contained some new word or phrase, coined extempore, and accentuated by a rope’s end, or ungentle back-hander, with gutter adjectives and explosive epithets. Every order appeared to require the force of a gathered passion, as though obedience was impossible without it. From this date began, I think, the noting of a strange coincidence, which has since been so common with me that I accept it as a rule. When I pray for a man, it happens that at that moment he is cursing me; when I praise, I am slandered; if I commend, I am reviled; if I feel affectionate or sympathetic towards one, it is my fate to be detested or scorned by him. I first noticed this curious coincidence on board the ‘Windermere.’ I bore no grudge, and thought no evil of any person, but prayed for all, morning and evening, extolled the courage, strength, and energy of my ship-mates, likened them to sea-lions, and felt it an honour to be in the company of such brave men; but, invariably, they damned my eyes, my face, my heart, my soul, my person, my nationality; I was damned aft, and damned forward. I was wholly obnoxious to everyone aboard, and the only service they asked of God towards me was that He should damn me to all eternity. It was a new idea that came across my mind. My memory clung to it as a novelty, and at every instance of the coincidence I became more and more confirmed that it was a rule, as applied to me; but, until it was established, I continued to bless those who persecuted me with their hideous curses. I am glad to think that I was sustained by a belief that I was doing right; for, without it, I should have given scope to a ferocious and blasphemous resentment. It cheered me with a hope that, by and by, their curses would be blessings; and, in the meantime, my mind was becoming as impervious to such troubles as a swan’s back to a shower of rain.