Page:The Naval Officer (1829), vol. 2.djvu/53

 was no danger of sudden squalls.—The ceremony of crossing the line, I am aware, has been often described—so has Italy and the Rhine; but there are varieties of ways of doing and relating these things; ours had its singularity, and ended, I am sorry to say, in a deep tragedy, which I shall remember "as long as memory holds her seat."

One beautiful morning, as soon as the people had breakfasted, they began to prepare, by stripping to their waists, and wearing nothing but a pair of duck trowsers. The man at the mast-head called out that he saw something on the weather-bow, which he thought was a boat; soon after, an unknown voice from the jib-boom hailed the ship; the officer of the watch 'answered; and the voice commanded him to heave to, as Neptune was coming on board. The ship was accordingly hove to with every formality, though going at the rate of seven miles an hour: the main-yard squared, the head and after-yards braced up.