DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.12673#0020
THE VOYAGE. 3
the bit of deck outside the cabin from the rajs of
a broiling sun. People the square space in the
middle of the boat with two nags tethered and tied
with halters and heel ropes, which sadly curtail the
poor animals' enjoyment of kicking and biting; and
half-a-dozen black "tars" engaged in pounding rice,
concocting bilious-looking masses of curry, and
keeping up a fire of some unknown wood, whose
pungent smoke is certain to find its way through
the cabin, and to terminate its wanderings in your
eyes and nostrils. Finally, throw in about the
same number of black domestics courting a watery
death by balancing themselves over the sides of the
vessel, or a fever by sleeping in a mummy case of
dirty cotton cloth—
And you have a pattimar in your mind's eye.
Every one that has ever sailed in a pattimar can
oblige you with a long list of pleasures peculiar to
it. All know how by day your eyes are blinded
with glare and heat, and how by night mosquitos, a
trifle smaller than jack snipes, assault your defence-
less limbs ; how the musk rat defiles your property
and provender ; how the common rat and the cock-
chafer appear to relish the terminating leather of
your fingers and toes; and, finally, how the im-
polite animal which the transatlantics delicately
the bit of deck outside the cabin from the rajs of
a broiling sun. People the square space in the
middle of the boat with two nags tethered and tied
with halters and heel ropes, which sadly curtail the
poor animals' enjoyment of kicking and biting; and
half-a-dozen black "tars" engaged in pounding rice,
concocting bilious-looking masses of curry, and
keeping up a fire of some unknown wood, whose
pungent smoke is certain to find its way through
the cabin, and to terminate its wanderings in your
eyes and nostrils. Finally, throw in about the
same number of black domestics courting a watery
death by balancing themselves over the sides of the
vessel, or a fever by sleeping in a mummy case of
dirty cotton cloth—
And you have a pattimar in your mind's eye.
Every one that has ever sailed in a pattimar can
oblige you with a long list of pleasures peculiar to
it. All know how by day your eyes are blinded
with glare and heat, and how by night mosquitos, a
trifle smaller than jack snipes, assault your defence-
less limbs ; how the musk rat defiles your property
and provender ; how the common rat and the cock-
chafer appear to relish the terminating leather of
your fingers and toes; and, finally, how the im-
polite animal which the transatlantics delicately