noon
He is a keen judge of the ship 's motions , for never yet have I seen him get a serious ducking . Sometimes , of course , he may get splattered with spray or wet to the knees , but he manages to be out of the way whenever a big graybeard falls on board . A wonderful event to-day ! For five minutes , at noon , the sun was actually visible . But such a sun ! -- a pale and cold and sickly orb that at meridian was only 90 degrees 18 minutes above the horizon . And within the hour we were taking in sail and lying down to the snow-gusts of a fresh south-west gale .