text:  The commencement of the voyage was prosperous; and the ship ran to the south before a fair wind interrupted only by a few days of partial calm till it reached the latitude of Ceylon where the appearance of the flying fish excited the special wonder of the khan who was by this time beginning under the tuition of his fellow passengers to make some progress in the English language and had even attempted to fathom some of the mysteries of the science of navigation; "but though I took the sextant which the captain handed me and held it precisely as he had done I could make nothing of it