However, as all persons intending to go ashore at Madras must pass through the surf, they step with what courage they can muster into their boat alongside the ship, anchored in the roads a couple of miles off, in consequence of the water being too shallow for large vessels.  The boat then shoves off, and rows to the “back of the surf,” where it is usual to let go a grapnel, or to lie on the oars till the masullah boat comes out.  The back of the surf is that part of the roadstead lying immediately beyond the place where the first indication is given of the tendency in the swell to rise into a wave; and no boat not expressly fitted for the purpose ever goes nearer to the shore, but lies off till the “bar-boat” makes her way through the surf, and lays herself alongside the ship’s boat.  A scrambling kind of boarding operation now takes place, to the last degree inconvenient to ladies and other shore-going persons not accustomed to climbing.  As the gunwale of the masullah boat rises three or four feet above the water, the step is a long and troublesome one to make, even by those who are not encumbered with petticoats—­those sad impediments to locomotion—­devised by the men, as I heard a Chinaman remark, expressly to check the rambling propensities of the softer sex, always too prone, he alleged, to yield to wandering impulses without such encumbrances!  I know to my cost, from many a broken shin, that even gentlemen bred afloat may contrive to slip in removing from one boat to the other, especially if the breeze be fresh, and there be what mariners call a “bubble of a sea.”  In a little while, however, all the party are tumbled, or hoisted into the masullah boat, where they seat themselves on the cross-bench, marvellously like so many culprits on a hurdle on their way to execution!  Ahead of them roars and boils a furious ridge of terrific breakers, while close at their ears behind, stamps and bawls, or rather yells, the steersman, who takes this method of communicating his wishes to his fellow-boatmen.  The steersman stands on his poop, or quarter-deck, just behind the miserable passengers, whose heads reach not quite so high as his knees.  His oar rests in a crutch on the top of the stern-post, and not only serves as a rudder, but gives him the power to slew or twist the boat round with considerable rapidity, when aided by the efforts of the rowers.  It is necessary for the steersman to wait for a favourable moment to enter the surf, otherwise the chances are that the boat will be upset, in the manner I shall describe presently.  People are frequently kept waiting in this way for ten or twenty minutes, at the back of the surf, before a proper opportunity presents itself.