CHAPTER V.
Sailing of the Tonquin .-- A Rigid Commander and a Reckless Crew .-- Landsmen on Shipboard .-- Fresh-Water Sailors at Sea .-- Lubber Nests .-- Ship Fare .-- A Labrador Veteran--Literary Clerks.-Curious Travellers .-- Robinson Crusoe's Island .-- Quarter-Deck Quarrels .-- Falkland Islands .-- A Wild-Goose Chase .-- Port Egmont.-Epitaph Hunting .-- Old Mortality-- Penguin Shooting .-- Sportsmen Left in the Lurch .-- A Hard Pull .-- Further Altercations .-- Arrival at Owyhee.
ON the eighth of September, 1810, the Tonquin put to sea, where she was soon joined by the frigate Constitution.

The wind was fresh and fair from the southwest, and the ship was soon out of sight of land and free from the apprehended danger of interruption.

The frigate, therefore, gave her "God speed," and left her to her course.
The harmony so earnestly enjoined by Mr.Astor on this heterogeneous crew, and which had been so confidently promised in the buoyant moments of preparation, was doomed to meet with a check at the very outset.
Captain Thorn was an honest, straighforward, but somewhat dry and dictatorial commander, who, having been nurtured in the system and discipline of a ship of war, and in a sacred opinion of the supremacy of the quarter-deck, was disposed to be absolute lord and master on board of his ship.

He appears, moreover, to have had no great opinion, from the first, of the persons embarked with him--He had stood by with surly contempt while they vaunted so bravely to Mr.Astor of all they could do and all they could undergo; how they could face all weathers, put up with all kinds of fare, and even eat dogs with a relish, when no better food was to be had.

He had set them down as a set of landlubbers and braggadocios, and was disposed to treat them accordingly.