A ship, consequently, which goes round the world from the east to the west will seem to have gained a clear day on circumnavigating the globe; while one that completes the same voyage sailing from the west continually towards the east, loses one." "How funny!" cried I.

"Is it really so ?" "Yes, really," said he; "and I've seen, on board a ship I was once in, the captain skip a day in the log, to make up for the one we lost on the voyage, passing over Saturday and writing down the day which followed Friday as `Sunday'-- otherwise we would have been all out of our reckoning with the almanac." "How funny!" I repeated.

"I never heard that before." "Probably not, nor many other things you'll learn at sea, my boy, before you're much older," answered Mr Mackay, as he turned to the log slate on which Captain Gillespie had been putting down his calculation about the ship's position after taking the sun and working out his reckoning.
"Let us see, now, if your watch is a good chronometer for telling our longitude.

Ha, by Jove, 13 degrees 10 minutes west, or, nearly what we made out just now.

Not so bad, Graham, for a turnip!" "Turnip, sir!" cried I indignantly.