Page:In a Steamer Chair and Other Stories.djvu/185

Rh good smart sailing vessel, with a fair wind, might have made it lively for us in an ocean race. The Tub was a broad, slow boat, whose great specialty was freight, and her very broadness, which kept her from being a racer, even if her engines had had the power, made her particularly comfortable in a storm. She rolled but little; and as the staterooms were large and airy, every passenger on board The Tub was sure of a reasonably pleasant voyage.

It was always amusing to hear the reasons each of the passengers gave for being on board The Tub. A fast and splendid liner of an opposition company left New York the next day, and many of our passengers explained to me they had come to New York with the intention of going by that boat, but they found all the rooms taken, that is, all the desirable rooms. Of course they might have had a room down on the third deck; but they were accustomed in traveling to have the best rooms, and if they couldn't be had, why it didn't much matter what was given them, so that was the reason they took passage on The Tub. Others were on the boat because they remembered the time when she was one of the fastest on the ocean, and they didn't like changing ships. Others again were particular friends of the captain, and he would have been annoyed if they had taken any other steamer.