I suppose, from present appearances,—­light winds and calms,—­that we shall be two or three weeks at sea, yet—­and I hope so—­I am in no hurry to go to work.

Sunday Morning, Aug. 6.  This is rather slow.  We still drift, drift, drift along—­at intervals a spanking breeze and then—­drift again—­hardly move for half a day.  But I enjoy it.  We have such snowy moonlight, and such gorgeous sunsets.  And the ship is so easy—­even in a gale she rolls very little, compared to other vessels—­and in this calm we could dance on deck, if we chose.  You can walk a crack, so steady is she.  Very different from the Ajax.  My trunk used to get loose in the stateroom and rip and tear around the place as if it had life in it, and I always had to take my clothes off in bed because I could not stand up and do it.

There is a ship in sight—­the first object we have seen since we left Honolulu.  We are still 1300 or 1400 miles from land and so anything like this that varies the vast solitude of the ocean makes all hands light-hearted and cheerful.  We think the ship is the “Comet,” which left Honolulu several hours before we did.  She is about twelve miles away, and so we cannot see her hull, but the sailors think it is the Comet because of some peculiarity about her fore-top-gallant sails.  We have watched her all the forenoon.

Afternoon We had preaching on the quarter-deck by Rev. Mr. Rising, of Virginia City, old friend of mine.  Spread a flag on the booby-hatch, which made a very good pulpit, and then ranged the chairs on either side against the bulwarks; last Sunday we had the shadow of the mainsail, but today we were on the opposite tack, close hauled, and had the sun.  I am leader of the choir on this ship, and a sorry lead it is.  I hope they will have a better opinion of our music in Heaven than I have down here.  If they don’t a thunderbolt will come down and knock the vessel endways.

The other ship is the Comet—­she is right abreast three miles away, sailing on our course—­both of us in a dead calm.  With the glasses we can see what we take to be men and women on her decks.  I am well acquainted with nearly all her passengers, and being so close seems right sociable.

Monday 7—­I had just gone to bed a little after midnight when the 2d mate came and roused up the captain and said “The Comet has come round and is standing away on the other tack.”  I went up immediately, and so did all our passengers, without waiting to dress-men, women and children.  There was a perceptible breeze.  Pretty soon the other ship swept down upon us with all her sails set, and made a fine show in the luminous starlight.  She passed within a hundred yards of us, so we could faintly see persons on her decks.  We had two minutes’ chat with each other, through the medium of hoarse shouting, and then she bore away to windward.

In the morning she was only a little black peg standing out of the glassy sea in the distant horizon—­an almost invisible mark in the bright sky.  Dead calm.  So the ships have stood, all day long—­have not moved 100 yards.