The Saloon Of Fifty Years Ago.

A particularly good story concerning the 1871 voyage of the Excelsior to Auckland is told by Mr. A. C. Yarborough of Kohukohu, who has been good enough to recount his experiencespage 100 just to show the sort of thing a saloon passenger had to put up with even as late as the seventies.

"It occurred to me," writes Mr. Yarborough "that the impressions of a saloon passenger who had never been to sea before except to cross the English Channel might be of interest, as differing in some respects from the routine passages made to this country by emigrant passengers. Having paid £70 for my berth I imagined that I should enjoy comfortable quarters, but to my surprise the saloon was divided into two—the port side cabin being reserved for First, and the starboard side for second-class passengers. On our side there was a gangway leading to the captain's roomy stateroom right aft, with a table jammed up against the partition wall, on the other side of which was the second-class accommodation with a gangway only, so that they had to get their meals as they could. There were also about 20 steerage passengers in the hold, who were battened down in bad weather. The officers were Captain Lees' brother first, and a second mate. The ship carried a boatswain, carpenter, two apprentices, and a crew of about 20. The ship had a constant leak, which necessitated pumping three time a day, and she was deep in the water as she was carrying iron rails as well as general cargo. There was no Plimsoll mark in those days.

"We left Gravesend on April 1. For the first week we had a regular course of beef steak, Irish stew, potatoes, biscuits and butter, and sometimes marmalade, varied by occasional sardines. Later we had to put up with salt pork and salt beef, pea soup, 'plum-duff' and biscuits. Limejuice was served out, and we seemed to keep in good health.

"Bad weather came on in the Bay of Biscay and the doors to the saloon had to be boarded up. In latitude 44 degrees we saw the most beautiful Aurora—brilliant red with scarlet streaks shooting up, one after another. I had scarcely thought the Aurora would be seen so far south. We had to lay-to here under reefed lower topsails and foresail, and the sea was a grand sight, but it rained and blew hard, and everything on deck seemed loose, making an appalling clatter, while the sea broke over the bows in cataracts. The screams of the women, the clatter of broken crockery and the difficulty of getting anything hot to drink made this part of the voyage quite an unpleasant memory.

"Up to this time we had taken three weeks over a distance that with any luck might have been travelled in four days. However, we soon had fine weather again and a fair wind. Off the Canaries two swallows came aboard and stayed twelve hours. They were so thirsty they drank water out of a tumbler held in the hand. In latitude 17 a ring-dove paid us a visit, and a little stranger something like a wren with a long beak also came aboard.

"Standing up on the martingale we had some good fun harpooning bonita which played about the bows, and this fish was quite a welcome change from salt horse. We crossed the line on May 6, thirty days out from the Lizard. In latitude 22 south the first albatross visited us—the harbinger of much more severe weather. At this time the ship was rolling bulwarks under, making it very unpleasant and for several days the water was constantly on her main deck. In latitude 36 south, we had with us a great deal of bird life—stormy petrels, Cape pigeons, Cape hens, mollyhawks albatrosses and whale birds. A mollyhawk would measure 6ft from tip to tip of wings, an albatross 10ft, and a Cape pigeon 32in.

"At this stage of the voyage some of the men used mutinous language, and one of them was put in irons. The crew then refused duty, but Captain Lees, who was of a fiery temperament, tackled the ringleader, giving him a blow on the ear, upon which the whole crew went forward, and we heard no more of it. On June 4 the halo round the moon was different from anything I have ever seen. There were three halos close to each other of a clear rainbow hue, like three minute rainbows surrounding it and close to it. Between longitude 43 and 62 and latitude 40 and 43 south we did some good sailing, ranging up to 300 miles per day, at the expense occasionally of a foot or so of water in the saloon.

"In latitude 44.37, longitude 72.49 east there was a heavy gale from the west, and we ran under three reefed lower topsails. The seas were magnificent, breaking occasionally over the poop, and constantly over the deck. During the afternoon of June 15th the wind increased. At 8 p.m. the captain and some more of us adjourned from a game of whist, feeling weary at the heavy motion of the ship. As we passed into the saloon the stern ports were burst in, the skylights carried away, and in a moment we were up to our necks in water, jammed up against the saloon door leading on to the main deck, while the row overhead, occasioned by the hen coops and other movables having got adrift, was appalling. The two men at the wheel had been washed forward and bruised. The wheel and binnacle, and everything movable had gone overboard. As some of the crew had got at the brandy, we passengers went to the pumps and clung there while the seas kept breaking acrosspage 101 the ship mast high. We were much relieved, when after an hours hard work, the carpenter announced that the pumps were sucking.

"In the meantime the saloon was full of water, which washed into the top berths and floated our belongings out. The fore part of the poop was stove in, and some of the boats damaged. From this time we were constantly pooped, while the main deck, the bulwarks having been carried away, was swept by the sea, and we were generally wet, without much chance of getting dry things. We went as far south as latitude 46.40, and had heavy weather all the time. There are few such magnificent sights as the sea at its angriest moments, viewed from the deck of a veesel of 600 tons register. I was a young chap and although sometimes scared to death, enjoyed the whole experience. Sailors are of course paid for it (even if they did in those days get only £3 a month and "salt horse"), but it was hard luck on a passenger who paid £70 for his ticket to have to put up with such conditions. We sighted the Three Kings on July 6, the first land since Land's End, having made the run from land to land in 91 days, and arrived at Auckland on July 8, 1871.

"Captain Lees was taken violently ill during the hard weather we had in June, and was again taken bad upon arriving in Auckland. On the evening of the arrival I went ashore about 8 p.m. to get a doctor. As the case was urgent I ran up Queen Street, away to Parnell, and thence to Newmarket—knocking up seven different medical men, none of them would attend. At last I got hold of Dr. Dawson, who on the previous trip had come out with Captain Lees. (Dr. Dawson married a sister of Mr. Reynolds mentioned above.) We set off with a waterman, but could not fetch the ship owing to hard wind and tide. That night I slept on a bench in the waterman's shed, on Queen Street wharf, not far from the Waitemata Hotel, and the doctor and I didn't get aboard the Excelsior until 7 o'clock the following morning.

"One of the most vivid memories of the voyage was that of the singing of the sailors' chanties, such as "Good-bye, Fare Ye Well," "Row, Boys, Row," "Whisky For My Johnny O," and "Rio Grande." Although you could not hear yourself speak on deck in a gale of wind, and you had to cling while you watched the crew anxiously trying ineffectually to reef-down, you would presently catch the refrain of one of these chanties, and the job was done."