Yr Ynys Unyg | Page 5

to go and play very much. But I am glad we are to have no
French. Jenny says Madame is very ill indeed, and I think I heard her
groan once."
Zoë.--"Groan, did you? then she must be very bad. I don't wish her to
groan much, but I don't mind if she is sick always from ten until two.
You know mother promised we should do no lessons after two. Here is
Jenny. Why, Jenny, what is the matter with you?"
Jenny.--"Indeed, Miss, I don't know; but just as I was fastening Miss

Sybil's dress, I felt so queer, and I was so ashamed, I was obliged to sit
down before all the young ladies."
All the little girls at once exclaimed, "Ah, Jenny, Jenny, you know you
are sea-sick." "No, indeed, young ladies," exclaimed Jenny, vehemently,
"I am sure it is no such thing; but Master Felix would have some cold
beef with Worcester sauce for his breakfast, and that gave me a turn, it
has such a strong smell." But ere Jenny had well got the words out of
her mouth, nature asserted her rights, and after an undeniable fit, she
reeled off to bed, and was a victim for three days. Hargrave, my maid,
being of a stolid, determined, sort of stoical character, announced her
intention of not giving way; and though a victim, or rather martyr, she
never suffered a sign to appear, or neglected one thing that she was
asked to do, or showed the smallest feeling on the occasion beyond a
general sense of dissatisfaction at all things connected with the sea. But
of all our sufferers none equalled my poor cousin. Not a word was to be
got out of her, but short pithy anathemas against everybody that came
near her, everybody that spoke to her, every lurch the ship made, every
noise overhead; an expression of pity caused an explosion of wrath, a
hope that she was better a wish that she was dead, and an offer of
assistance a command to be gone out of her sight. Neither of the boys
suffered in the least. And now the increased motion of the vessel, the
noise overhead, and various other signs told us that the lovely smooth
ocean, on whose bosom we had trusted ourselves, for some cause
unknown to us was considerably disturbed, internally or externally. It
was impossible for any land-lubbers to stand; it was equally impossible
to eat in the form prescribed by the rules of polite society, food being
snatched at a venture, and not always arriving at the mouth for which it
was originally intended. One or two were pitched out of their cots, and
a murmuring of fear that this should be a tempest, and that we were
going to be wrecked, caused a message to be sent to Captain MacNab
to know whereabouts we were, for no one liked to be first to
acknowledge fear or expose our ignorance to the Captain, who had
good-humouredly rallied some on what they would do and say in case
of bad weather. Therefore the question of whereabouts are we seemed a
very safe one, likely to obtain the real news we wanted without
exposing our fears to the captain. In answer, we received a message to

say we were near the Bay of Biscay and as there was a very pretty sea,
we should do well to come up and look at it. "Come up and look at it?"
that showed at once that no shipwreck was in contemplation. But how
to get up? that was the question. The message, however, was
dispatched round to the different berths, with the additional one, "that
the mother was going immediately," that being my title amongst the
young ones, and the little mother being the title of my cousin.
On deck we were received by the captain, who welcomed us with much
pleasure, an undisguised twinkle in his eyes betraying a little inkling
into the purport of our message. To our amazement, he and the sailors
seemed quite at their ease, walking as steadily as if the vessel was a
rock, and as immoveable as the pyramids. But what a sea! I looked up
and saw high grey mountains on all sides, and ere I could decide
whether they were moveable or my sight deceptive, they had
disappeared, and, from a height that seemed awful, we looked down
upon a troubled, rolling, restless mass of waters, each wave seeming to
buffet its neighbour with an angry determination to put it down. In the
midst of all this chaos, one monster wave rose superior to all the rest,
and rolling forward with giant strength and resistless impetuosity,
threatened instant destruction to the vessel. A cry, a terrific roll, a
shudder through the vessel,