and tumble into the boat, which is laden to the water’s edge by new passengers from East London and their luggage.  When, however, we have reached the rolling Florence it is no easy matter to get out of the said boat and on board.  There is a ladder let down, indeed, from the Florence’s side, but how are we to use it when one moment half a dozen rungs are buried deep in the sea, and the next instant ship and ladder and all have rolled right away from us?  It has to be done, however, and what a tower of strength and encouragement does “Capting Florence” prove himself at this juncture!  We are all to sit perfectly still:  no one is to move until his name is called, and then he is to come unhesitatingly and do exactly what he is told.

“Pass up the baby!” is the first order which I hear given, and that astonishing baby is “passed up” accordingly.  I use the word “astonishing” advisedly, for never was an infant so bundled about uncomplainingly.  He is just as often upside down as not; he is generally handed from one quartermaster to the other by the gathers of his little blue flannel frock; seas break over his cradle on deck, but nothing disturbs him.  He grins and sleeps and pulls at his bottle through everything, and grows fatter and browner and more impudent every day.  On this occasion, when—­after rivaling Leotard’s most daring feats on the trapeze in my scramble up the side of a vessel which was lurching away from me—­I at last reached the deck, I found the ship’s carpenter nursing the baby, who had seized the poor man’s beard firmly with one hand, and with the finger and thumb of the other was attempting to pick out one of his merry blue eyes.  “Avast there!” cried the long-suffering sailor, and gladly relinquished the mischievous bundle to me.

Up with the anchor, and off we go once more into the gathering darkness of what turns out to be a wet and windy night.  Next day the weather had recovered its temper, and I was called upon deck directly after breakfast to see the “Gates of St. John,” a really fine pass on the coast where the river Umzimvubu rushes through great granite cliffs into the sea.  If the exact truth is to be told, I must confess I am a little disappointed with this coast-scenery.  I have heard so much of its beauty, and as yet, though I have seen it under exceptionally favorable conditions of calm weather, which has allowed us to stand in very close to shore, I have not seen anything really fine until these “Gates” came in view.  It has all been monotonous, undulating downs, here and there dotted with trees, and in some places the ravines were filled with what we used to call in New Zealand bush—­i.e., miscellaneous greenery.  Here and there a bold cliff or tumbled pile of red rock makes a landmark for the passing ships, but otherwise the uniformity is great indeed.  The ordinary weather along this coast is something frightful, and the great reputation of our little Florence is built on the method in which she rides