- The short length we have picked
up was covered at places with beautiful sprays of coral, twisted
and twined with shells of those small, fairy animals we saw in the
aquarium at home; poor little things, they died at once, with their
little bells and delicate bright tints.
'12 O'CLOCK. - Hurrah, victory! for the present anyhow. Whilst in
our first dejection, I thought I saw a place where a flat roller
would remedy the whole misfortune; but a flat roller at Cape
Spartivento, hard, easily unshipped, running freely! There was a
grooved pulley used for the paying-out machinery with a spindle
wheel, which might suit me. I filled him up with tarry spunyarn,
nailed sheet copper round him, bent some parts in the fire; and we
are paying-in without more trouble now. You would think some one
would praise me; no, no more praise than blame before; perhaps now
they think better of me, though.
'10 P.M. - We have gone on very comfortably for nearly six miles.
An hour and a half was spent washing down; for along with many
coloured polypi, from corals, shells and insects, the big cable
brings up much mud and rust, and makes a fishy smell by no means
pleasant: the bottom seems to teem with life.
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