I must put the date as soon as I catch up anybody who can give me the day of the week and month; but I have a clear idea that we landed here on the Tuesday week (at three) after we left Portsmouth—exactly a ten days’ passage to an hour; and that it is supposed to have been one of the most prosperous and quick passages ever made, without a single check or accident. But such a job as I made of it!—as sick as death the whole way, after the first two hours; and the last five days I never got out of bed, nor dressed myself. Oh, dear! what work it is! The last night I was so ill that I was obliged to send for George to come and carry me on deck, where, as it was quite dark and the poop quite deserted, I might be as ill as I liked. Such violent shiverings, from want of food and sleep, for though every ship must roll more or less in such rapid sailing, yet everybody on board agrees that there never was such a rolling, creaking article as the ‘Jupiter.’ You cannot conceive anything like the constant noise of it; and when that comes in addition to sleeplessness and eternal sickness, the suffering from it is past all belief.
However, it cannot be helped; but if I could scuttle that ship, or blow her out of the water, or swim home, or do anything in a mild way to get out of the scrape, I would.
George was rather giddy occasionally, but is, in fact, as happy as a king; so far the aim of our voyage is attained. Fanny is perfectly wonderful at sea. The last three days she was bored by being kept awake by the creaking of the bulkheads; but she is never the least giddy, nor sick at the worst of times—very active, and reads, works, and plays at chess; and it was a positive mercy to me that she was so well and so serviceable, as the past two days Wright and Jones were knocked up, but rallied wonderfully afterwards. ’s spirits never fail, and he is an amazing favourite on board. The older midshipmen (who might be admirals, poor fellows! in times of war) coax him down to the cockpit, because they have kept their one bottle of brandy as a treat for him; and he never opens his lips that they don’t all begin laughing long before the joke comes. They hold up a cigar from the farthest point of the ship to entice him down to them; and the officers are much the same. He declares his sea-sickness is quite as bad as mine, only it has taken the contrary and more alarming line of extreme hunger; so that it is quite meritorious of him to struggle against the complaint as he does by going to dine in the cockpit at twelve, then to come and taste my macaroni at one, then to luncheon with Captain Grey at two; and he thinks he ought to pick a bit with the oflicers at three, in order to be tolerably well for dinner at six.
The men servants have all been quite well. The ayah has been the happiness of my life, and is a great favourite with everybody. She is always merry, and she pokes about the ship, and gets biscuits and macaroni at odd undue hours; for there is nothing so provoking as the hours on board ship—the fire is always put out just as one fancies one might swallow a little tea.
The ayah took advantage of my weak and defenceless condition to establish herself for the night in my cabin, and when I looked up in the night, there she was wrapped up in a heap of Indian shawls, flat on the ground, with her black arms (covered with bracelets) crossed over her head—very picturesque, but rather shocking, and I wish she would sleep anywhere else; at least, I did at first—I am used to it now. Chance is extremely happy; except one or two very rough nights, when his little fat body was rolled off his cushion every five minutes, and he gave a deep indignant sigh, and a half-growl, and then gathered his tail and ears and his dispersed limbs all together again, and rolled back to his nest. The midshipmen imparted to that they should not like the captain to know it, but they contrived to get Chance down below in the morning, and turned out a little rabbit for his amusement, and had been in a great fright one day that he had caught it.
So much for the voyage. I feel certain that I shall never be brought on board again but by a guard of marines. We go on Friday night. This island is entirely lovely. Nothing is worth a day at sea, but as that cannot be avoided I am glad Madeira is our resting-place. We landed at three yesterday, after visits from the consul, salutes, &c., and got into palanquins at the landing-place, and were carried through a long narrow street with occasional intervals of gardens, where are palms and bananas and great orange-trees covered with fruit, and odd Murillo-looking women taking great care of each other’s hair—in short, everything looked tropical, and like a book of travels, and untrue. By-the-by, that puts me in mind that we went out of our course one night at sea, to avoid Cape Finisterre. Can’t you hear poor Mrs. Mather’s voice teaching us Cape Finisterre? and I never believed it was a real thing, or that it would ever come Cape-ing and Finisterre-ing into my actual path of life; but there is no saying how things may turn out, only there is no use in learning it all beforehand.
Well! our palanquin-bearers trotted us into the hall of a large house belonging to a Mr. Stothard, which George had been told to make his home by the other half of the firm in London. It turned out that no ship had arrived from England for a month, so the letter of recommendation was still at sea, Mr. Stothard in the country, and Mrs. S. ill. However, a little clerk received us, and Mr. Stothard was fetched up from the country, and found us four and Captain Grey, and six servants and a dog, all settled in his house, mad for food, and intending to stay with him. He took it all as a matter of course, got some dinner as soon as he could collect his servants, gave us magnificent rooms, with delicious large clean beds that did not rock nor creak, and to-day he has been showing us the country, and we are all violently attached to him.
I never saw a more delightful man, so hospitable and pleasant. Tomorrow we are to dine with the Portuguese governor, who sent in a guard of honour and an aide-de-camp every half-hour to know if we wanted anything; and Madame came to see Fanny and me in the only carriage that grows at Madeira, for the streets are so narrow and the hills so perpendicular that a carriage is of no use. We took such a ride to-day—three miles up these hills! which I think incline a little forwards; but that may be a traveller’s story. It was dreadfully hot at first, but we rode up into the clouds, through such hedges of fuchsia and myrtle, with geraniums covering the ground, and that great pink cactus that we keep in hot-houses making the common fence by the roadside. Each pony has an odd wild-looking driver, who runs by him and lays hold of his tail coming down; but the descent was awful! It is as says, ‘just the case, for “God is good, and Mahomet is His prophet,” so let us each take the tail of each other’s pony and slither into the sea. The “Jupiter” must send out her boats to pick up the great man.’
As for my state of mind, the less I say about that the better; but it is not cheering to pass ten days entirely on my own thoughts just after leaving all of you—a way of life that is perfectly hateful to me. I cannot read to keep myself straight. However, I suppose things will turn out better somehow; if not, ‘the time is short’ as compared with what follows. And so God bless you, my dearest friend, and tell the chicks that their picture hangs at the foot of my bed, and is a great comfort to me.
Of course you never do anything but write to me?