We dine with the Portuguese governor to-day, and to-morrow have company at home, go on board after dinner, and get under weigh at one in the morning; and in about eleven days I shall be thrown overboard, for I am nearly transparent now with thinness, and never shall stand more than another ten days.
Keep writing, for mercy’s sake.
But I know we are within ten degrees of the line, and that the thermometer is at 80° the coolest part of the twenty-four hours, and that though they say we have been only twenty-four days on board, I am quite sure it must be nearly a year.
This is to be the beginning of a letter to you, and if the ship does not roll always, I will try to turn it into a journal, and you must keep it, as I cannot write another for myself, and should like to know in after-days how much I endured on board this monster. I shall never believe it when I read it.
