thought I, and took my last look of that place too. And on the next morning we were under the high point of San Diego. The flood tide took us swiftly in, and we came-to opposite our hide-house, and prepared to get everything in trim for a long stay. This was our last port. Here we were to discharge everything from the ship, clean her out, smoke her, take in our hides, wood, and water, and set sail for Boston. While all this was doing, we were to lie still in one place, the port a safe one, and no fear of southeasters. Accordingly, having picked out a good berth in the stream, with a smooth beach opposite for a landing-place, and within two cables' length of our hide-house, we moored ship, unbent the sails, sent down the top-gallant-yards and the studding-sail booms, and housed the top-gallant-masts. The boats were then hove out and all the sails, the spare spars, the stores, the rigging not rove, and, in fact, everything which was not in daily use, sent ashore, and stowed away in the house. Then went our hides and horns, and we left hardly anything in the ship but her ballast, and this we made preparations to heave out the next day. At night, after we had knocked off, and were sitting round in the forecastle, smoking and talking, and taking sailor's pleasure, we congratulated ourselves upon being in that situation in which we had wished ourselves every time we had come into San Diego. ``If we were only here for the last time,'' we had often said, ``with our top-gallant-masts housed and our sails unbent!''-- and now we had our wish. Six weeks, or two months, of the hardest work we had yet seen, but not the most disagreeable or trying, was before us, and then-- ``Good by to California!'' CHAPTER XXIX We turned-in early, knowing that we might expect an early call; and sure enough, before the stars had quite faded, ``All hands ahoy!'' and we were turned-to, heaving out ballast. A regulation of the port forbids any ballast to be thrown overboard; accordingly, our long-boat was lined inside with rough boards and brought alongside the gangway, but where one tubful went into the boat twenty went overboard. This is done by every vessel, as it saves more than a week of labor, which would be spent in loading the boats, rowing them to the point, and unloading them. When any people from the presidio were on board, the boat was hauled up and the ballast thrown in; but when the coast was clear, she was dropped astern again, and the ballast fell overboard. This is one of those petty frauds which many vessels practise in ports of inferior foreign nations, and which are lost sight of among the deeds of greater weight which are hardly less common. Fortunately, a sailor, not being a free agent in work aboard ship, is not accountable; yet the fact of being constantly employed, without thought, in such things, begets an indifference to the rights of others.