The utter prostration of all energy which attends sea-sickness is well known to those who have passed the ordeal. I was a sufferer with the rest, but not to the same extent as many others. When daylight broke, I was on deck, and stirring, and became accustomed to the Lydia Ann's antics with so little difficulty that the old skipper noticed me particularly; and finding I was the only one who could do full justice to an "able-bodied breakfast," he complimented me by averring his belief that I would be a sailor yet before my mother would. Which prophecy seemed in a fair way of fulfilment; for I gained so rapidly that before the sloop went in over Nantucket Bar, I was able to take an interest in all I saw and even to lend a hand about decks. I was rather vain of the comparatively easy victory which my stomach had gained over old Neptune's medicine chest, and lost no opportunity of cracking jokes upon others, whose course of initiation had been more severe. Some of the boys who came over in the Lydia Ann will never forget the martyrdom they endured from this intolerable malady, which, when violent, makes even life and death seem a matter of indifference, and not the least irritating peculiarity of which is that it is a standing subject for joking by those who have passed through it, and that even the very pity which the initiated traveller bestows upon us is akin to ridicule. CHAPTER II. IN AND OUT OVER THE BAR. Two whaleships were lying at anchor outside the "bar" as the Lydia Ann passed in--one lately arrived from a long voyage, her rusty sides and rough bends nearly naked of copper, with the long grass clinging to the bare sheathing; her stump topmasts and general half-dismantled appearance presenting a striking contrast to the trim, newly-painted outward-bounder, which had just completed her preparations for sea, and, with everything aloft in its place, mainroyal yard crossed, and a full quota of showy, white-bottomed boats on the cranes and overhead, was to weigh anchor for the Pacific next morning. Loud rose the cheerful, measured sound of the hoisting song from the gang on board the inward-bound ship, as the heavy casks of oil were seen to rise slowly from her hatchway, and were discharged into the schooner lashed alongside of her to receive them, while another lighter, deeply loaded, had dropped astern, and was hoisting her mainsail. "I thought the 'Pandora' had sailed before this time," said the old skipper, as we passed just out of hail of the ships. "They have been a long time fitting her for sea. I wonder," said he to his mate, "who that is that has got in since we left. Get the glass, and see if you can make out her name when we cross her stern." The mate brought an old battered telescope from a cleet in the companionway, and, after squinting for some time, muttered: