The sea was rather rough, but Caesar and I fortified our stomachs with a bottle of English ale, and as it was dark by this time, sought our resting-places for the night.  As we had paid double, places were assured us in the coop on deck, but beds were not included in the bargain.  The Maltese, who had brought mattresses and spread a large Phalansteriau bed in the hold, fared much better.  I took one of my carpet bags for a pillow and lay down on the planks, where I succeeded in getting a little sleep between the groans of the helpless land-lubbers.  We had the ponente, or west-wind, all night, but the speronara moved sluggishly, and in the morning it changed to the greco-levante, or north-east.  No land was in sight; but towards noon, the sky became clearer, and we saw the southern coast of Sicily—­a bold mountain-shore, looming phantom-like in the distance.  Cape Passaro was to the east, and the rest of the day was spent in beating up to it.  At sunset, we were near enough to see the villages and olive-groves of the beautiful shore, and, far behind the nearer mountains, ninety miles distant, the solitary cone of Etna.

The second night passed like the first, except that our bruised limbs were rather more sensitive to the texture of the planks.  We crawled out of our coop at dawn, expecting to behold Catania in the distance; but there was Cape Passaro still staring us in the face.  The Maltese were patient, and we did not complain, though Caesar and I began to make nice calculations as to the probable duration of our two cold fowls and three loaves of bread.  The promontory of Syracuse was barely visible forty miles ahead; but the wind was against us, and so another day passed in beating up the eastern coast.  At dusk, we overtook another speronara which had left Malta two hours before us, and this was quite a triumph to our captain, All the oars were shipped, the sailors and some of the more courageous passengers took hold, and we shot ahead, scudding rapidly along the dark shores, to the sound of the wild Maltese songs.  At length, the promontory was gained, and the restless current, rolling down from Scylla and Charybdis, tossed our little bark from wave to wave with a recklessness that would have made any one nervous but an old sailor like myself.

“To-morrow morning,” said the Captain, “we shall sail into Catania;” but after a third night on the planks, which were now a little softer, we rose to find ourselves abreast of Syracuse, with Etna as distant as ever.  The wind was light, and what little we made by tacking was swept away by the current, so that, after wasting the whole forenoon, we kept a straight course across the mouth of the channel, and at sunset saw the Calabrian Mountains.  This move only lost us more ground, as it happened.  Caesar and I mournfully and silently consumed our last fragment of beef, with the remaining dry crusts of bread, and then sat down doggedly to smoke and see whether the captain would discover our situation.  But no; while we were supplied, the whole vessel was at our Lordships’ command, and now that we were destitute, he took care to make no rash offers.  Caesar, at last, with an imperial dignity becoming his name, commanded dinner.  It came, and the pork and maccaroni, moistened with red Sicilian wine, gave us patience for another day.