CHRISTMAS AT SEA

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 December 1939, Page 17 (Supplement)

CHRISTMAS AT SEA

ON AN EARLY EMIGRANT SHIP ROUGH TIME FOR PASSENGERS. DUFF THAT MET DISASTER. An account of an attempt to celebrate Christmas on an emigrant ship of the very early days, rolling in a gale, is given by Edwin Hodder, in his "Memories of New Zealand Life." which he published in 1862. some years after the experiences he describes. He came out to the young settlement of Nelson as a second-class passenger. The second-class folk, even in those days, were between the devil and the deep blue sea, caught in the cross-fire of cabin passengers who looked down on the second cabin and the steerage passengers who regarded them as conceited upstarts. Even more depressing was the melancholy second cabin itself. in which passengers of good middle-class station, by the light of two miserable oil-lamps, contemplated oil-cloth covered tables, low forms, all-pervading cold and damp, and the complete absence of the steward promised by the company’s prospectuses. Nor was the food very appetising or markedly differentiated from what was issued to the steerage people. They had only a quart of water each per day for drinking or cooking. (They washed in salt water). Hodder was sadly deceived by the company’s assurances that nothing need be taken aboard by the passenger. The ship provided only one plate each for use in the consumption of a variety of dishes. However, Christmas was coming, and every one was waiting impatiently for the noble fare that would accompany this happy season.

GALA DAY OF PASSAGE., "When our voyage was about half over, Christmas Day arrived —the grand gala day of the passage,” wrote Hodder. “It was to be celebrated by a dinner party; plum puddings were made a week before the event; all the luxuries that could be collected were reserved for the occasion; and innumerable plans were laid for spending the day as much according to old English fashion as circumstances would allow, despite the fact that we were in the tropics. But on Christmas Eve a heavy gale of wind began to blow, and on the morning of the eventful day it had so much increased as to render it unsafe for the ladies to be on deck, and everything was damp and wretched below. The compliments of the season were given and received with a sickly giggle, and nobody had the heart to be merry. The doctor came down to congratulate us. and presented each person with a bottle of some good port he had on board as medical comforts. Everybody put on their best clothes, and wandered about talking of how they spent last Christmas. "The great event of the day was to be the dinner party, and at one o’clock we were all seated waiting for it to be served up. But at the eleventh hour the cook came down to say that owing to the rough weather the meat pies—which were to constitute the first course—were not done, and that when they were, he feared they would not be fit to eat, as the sea had broken over the deck, swamping the galley, and soaking the pastry with salt water.

THE CROWNING FEATURE. "This was a sad damper, but we tried to make the best of it, and had the third course first, namely bread and cheese —the former article being esteemed a great luxury after faring |so long upon hard biscuits. Then came the pudding—the crowning feature of the banquet: but it came in a peculiar way. Our vessel was an awful roller, and on this day she was reeling. . . One of the passengers who prided himself on his 'sea legs’ was deputed to go and fetch the pudding: a post of honour which he felt to be a flattering distinction. He went; he safely brought it back as far as the hatchway, and then a heavy sea struck the vessel's side, and the unfortunate pudding came rolling down the ladder, and burst into numerous fragments at our feet! The pieces were collected, scraped, and placed on a dish, and we still magnanimously endeavoured to make fun of the matter; but when we commenced eating it. and discovered that it had been boiled in salt water, and that our week’s rations of plums and flour, together with almonds and other luxuries, were all spoilt, human patience could brook it no longer, and we lifted up our voices and howled imprecations on the cook, and "John Blank,’ and everybody and everything.” v