about noon
I 'll warrant you , he 'll give us a famous time of it , if he ever get us up on the North-West Coast . '' Here the consultation terminated , we mates believing it wiser to let things take their course . I confess to having seen the mountains on our weather-quarter disappear , with melancholy forebodings . There was little hope of getting any observation that day ; and to render matters worse , about noon , the wind began to haul more to the southward . As it hauled , it increased in violence , until , at midnight , it blew a gale ; the commencement of such a tempest as I had never witnessed in any of my previous passages at sea . As a matter of course , sail was reduced as fast as it became necessary , until we had brought the ship down to a close-reefed main-top-sail , the fore-top-mast staysail , the fore-course , and the mizen-staysail . This was old fashioned Canvass ; the more recent spencer being then unknown .