Your present remark, too, shows you
understand where a ship ought to be, in order to be in her right place. As
for the trades, they are a little uncertain, like a lady's mind when she
has more than one good offer; for I've known them to blow as high as
thirty, and then again, to fail a vessel as low as twenty-three, or even
lower. It is my private opinion, gentlemen, and I gladly take this
opportunity to make it public, that we are on the edge of the trades, or
in those light baffling winds which prevail along their margin, as eddies
play near the track of strong steady currents in the ocean. If we can
force the ship fairly out of this trimming region--that is the word, I
believe, Mr. Dodge--we shall do well enough; for a north-east, or an east
wind, would soon send us up with the islands, even under the rags we
carry. We are very near the coast, certainly--much nearer than I could
wish; but when we do get the good breeze, it will be all the better for
us, as it will find us well to windward."
"But these trades, Captain Truck?" asked Eve: "if they always blow in the
same direction, how is it possible that the late gale should drive a ship
into the quarter of the ocean where they prevail?"
"Always, means sometimes, my dear young lady. Although light winds prevail
near the edge of the trades, gales and tremendous fellows too, sometimes
blow there also, as we have just seen.
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