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A light southeaster, to which we could carry a reefed topmast studding-sail, did wonders for our dead reckoning. Friday, December 4th. After a passage of twenty days, we arrived at the mouth of the Bay of San Francisco. I have been told that this description of a whaleman has given offence to the whale-trading people of Nantucket, New Bedford, and the Vineyard.
The third day after our arrival, the Rosa came in from San Juan, where she went the day after the southeaster. Her crew said it was as smooth as a mill-pond after the gale, and she took off nearly a thousand hides, which had been brought down for us, and which we lost in consequence of the southeaster.
The mate saw him two or three times while he was a-lyin' in New York, and noticed he was drinkin' more 'n usual. He come home light and anchored off the bar, just as a southeaster was a-comin' on. It wouldn't 'a' been no trouble for him to have laid there, if he'd had good ground-gear; but there 'twas ag'in, he'd been a leetle too savin'. He'd used the old cables he found in her.
Arrived at San Pedro on the fourth day, and came-to in the old place, a league from shore, with no other vessel in port, and the prospect of three weeks or more of dull life, rolling goods up a slippery hill, carrying hides on our heads over sharp stones, and, perhaps, slipping for a southeaster.
It was eleven o'clock before a quick veering of the wind brought a downpour so violent that what had gone before seemed little better than a rather weak rehearsal. "It will clear presently," Stillman assured Claire. "Southeaster always break up in a flurry like this from the west." In ten minutes the stars were peeping brilliantly through rents in the torn clouds.
Nothing of note occurred while we were lying here, except that an attempt was made to repair the small Mexican brig which had been cast away in a southeaster, and which now lay up, high and dry, over one reef of rocks and two sand-banks.
In the hands of an enterprising people, what a country this might be! we are ready to say. Yet how long would a people remain so, in such a country? Saturday, July 18th. This day sailed the Mexican hermaphrodite brig Fazio, for San Blas and Mazatlan. This was the brig which was driven ashore at San Pedro in a southeaster, and had been lying at San Diego to repair and take in her cargo.
While we were carrying the hides to the boat, I perceived, what I had been too busy to observe before, that heavy black clouds were rolling up from seaward, a strong swell heaving in, and every sign of a southeaster. The captain hurried everything.
The southeaster sends endless battalions of waves rolling up there when it blows. These rear white heads over the Rock and burst on the Point with shuddering impact and showers of spray.
But the southeaster abated, and the usual northwest wind came out again, and we sailed steadily down into the roadstead of Monterey Bay. This is shaped somewhat like a fish hook, the barb being the harbor, the point being Point Pinos, the southern headland.
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