The conversation was interrupted by the sound of the dinner gong, and passengers began to troop down from the deck to the dining saloon. Seasickness had not yet come on to take away their appetites. The earl, who had been a silent, though interested, listener to the story of the old skipper, and who had his own private opinion of young Roland Bayard’s position in the pirate ship, arose and drew the arm of Rosemary within his own, to take her down to dinner. Old Capt. Grandiere offered his to Mrs. Force. Mr. Force took his eldest daughter, and Wynnette made a manly bow and took Elva under her protection. And so they went down to their first dinner on the _Asia_, and their last for several days, for a more stormy passage than that of the _Asia_ which sailed on that March morning was never weathered by ocean steamer. After dinner the old skipper went on deck to smoke his pipe alone. The Forces went down into the ladies’ cabin, to look at their staterooms, arrange their effects, and get comfortably settled in their quarters before seasickness should overtake and disable them. Our party occupied three staterooms in a row, on the right-hand side of the cabin as you entered it from the forward gangway. Nearest the gangway was the stateroom of Mr. and Mrs. Force; next to that the one of Odalite and Elva; and last of the three was that of Rosemary and Wynnette. All the three rooms were exactly alike, and each had a door opening into the cabin, and opposite the door a little window looking out on the sea and sky. On the left hand as you entered there was a wide berth at the bottom and a narrow one at the top. On the right hand was the wide sofa. Under the lower berth and under the sofa were deep drawers to hold the sea wardrobe and other effects of the passengers. In the angle between the side of the window and the end of the sofa was a stationary washstand, with all needful accessories. In the angle between the other end of the sofa and the door leading into the cabin was a stationary lamp, locked up in a heavy plate glass box, and carefully lighted and locked up every night, and unlocked and extinguished every morning, by the stateroom steward. The little door of this glass box or closet was in the general cabin, so that the lamp could be attended without intrusion into the stateroom. For the rest, all the fittings of the staterooms were “cabinet finished”; the floor was covered with a thick crimson Brussels carpet; the berths and the windows curtained by crimson satin damask, and the sofa covered with crimson moreen. Under the stationary lamp was a corner bracket of black walnut, with three shelves to hold books, or anything else that could be contained on the limited space. Below the Forces’ quarters was a long row of staterooms exactly like their own, and on the opposite side of the cabin a corresponding row, all occupied by ladies and families who were total strangers to the Forces, and perhaps, in many cases, to each other also.