The accommodation on board is not nearly so good as in an English yacht, partly owing to the little height between decks, consequent upon her very small draught of water, and partly owing to the great space taken up by the case for the centre-board; besides which, it should be remembered that a yacht is not used as a home in America in the same way as in England.  The great, and, I might almost say, the only quality, transatlantic yachtsmen care about is speed; and I think my yachting friends at Cowes must admit that they have proved that they know how to attain their end, and that Mr. Steers, the builder of the “America,” is second to none in his craft; unless the “Black Maria” some future day assume a practicable rig, and, crossing the Atlantic, earn the victor’s laurels, in which case Steers will have to yield the palm to the worthy fraternity, who are at one and the same time the owners, builders, and sailers of the subject of this chapter.

I believe it is very generally considered that the wind-up of a day’s sport is by no means the least enjoyable portion of the twenty-four hours, when it comes in the shape of good fellowship and good cheer; and upon the present occasion we had both alike undeniable of their kind.  The commodore’s cellar is as rich a rarity in its way as the Bernal collection, and, from the movement of the corks, I should imagine it was upon an equally large scale.  I do not purpose inflicting a bill of fare upon you; but, having, in the foregoing pages, made a promise to furnish the proper recipe for Toddy and Chowder, I consider this the proper place to redeem that promise, under the guidance of my hospitable host, who initiated me fully into the mysteries of mixture, proportion, &c., by making both before me.

Whether it is of great importance to adhere exactly to the recipes, I cannot pretend to say; the soup was pronounced on all hands to be most excellent, and some of the knowing ones declared it was unusually good.  We afterwards found out a good reason for its superior excellence.  It appears that the commodore had given some instructions to the steward, which he evidently had not understood, for, upon asking that functionary towards the end of dinner for a bottle of fine old Madeira which had been kept back as a bonnebouche, he gave a wild stare-of astonishment, and said he had put it all into the chowder.  This little addition, I can testify, most certainly did not spoil it.  The toddy was not subject to any such unwarrantable addition; and, if I may judge from the quantity taken by my neighbours, they all found it as delicious a drink as I did myself.

Recipes.

TODDY.—­4 tumblers of water:  1 ditto, sugar:  peel of 5 lemons, and dessert spoon of the juice:  add a few pieces of peach and pine-apple, and some strawberries.  Quarter of an hour before use, throw in 2 tumblers of old rum and a lump or two of block ice.