“It has been a glorious day hot sun & no rain. In the morning Joey & I had some beer & for dinner they gave us fresh pork which was a treat as it was the first fresh meat since we left the downs.

In the afternoon we had a sleep to digest the plum pudding & the desert!! The sailors have also been living well, getting same grog as ourselves & grog twice which is something unusual as we are on board a teetotal ship. I’ve not forgotten my old friends as some may perhaps have thought me being at home in a warm room but I drink to all absent friends with Joey in a glass of the pure & inexpensive. It is now getting late & I hope it may not be long before I can get into a bed at a respectable height from the floor for I am now as some of you will know up in the Gods. So goodnight.”

Extract from A.Whelen’s historical Australia travel journal when sailing aboard the iron clipper “Hesperides” from England to Melbourne in 1878