American Notes | Page 6

in scores, beef, veal, and pork, and
poultry out of all proportion; and others were coiling ropes and busy
with oakum yarns; and others were lowering heavy packages into the
hold; and the purser's head was barely visible as it loomed in a state, of
exquisite perplexity from the midst of a vast pile of passengers' luggage;
and there seemed to be nothing going on anywhere, or uppermost in the
mind of anybody, but preparations for this mighty voyage. This, with
the bright cold sun, the bracing air, the crisply-curling water, the thin
white crust of morning ice upon the decks which crackled with a sharp
and cheerful sound beneath the lightest tread, was irresistible. And
when, again upon the shore, we turned and saw from the vessel's mast
her name signalled in flags of joyous colours, and fluttering by their
side the beautiful American banner with its stars and stripes, - the long
three thousand miles and more, and, longer still, the six whole months
of absence, so dwindled and faded, that the ship had gone out and come
home again, and it was broad spring already in the Coburg Dock at
Liverpool.
I have not inquired among my medical acquaintance, whether Turtle,
and cold Punch, with Hock, Champagne, and Claret, and all the slight
et cetera usually included in an unlimited order for a good dinner -
especially when it is left to the liberal construction of my faultless
friend, Mr. Radley, of the Adelphi Hotel - are peculiarly calculated to

suffer a sea-change; or whether a plain mutton-chop, and a glass or two
of sherry, would be less likely of conversion into foreign and
disconcerting material. My own opinion is, that whether one is discreet
or indiscreet in these particulars, on the eve of a sea-voyage, is a matter
of little consequence; and that, to use a common phrase, 'it comes to
very much the same thing in the end.' Be this as it may, I know that the
dinner of that day was undeniably perfect; that it comprehended all
these items, and a great many more; and that we all did ample justice to
it. And I know too, that, bating a certain tacit avoidance of any allusion
to to-morrow; such as may be supposed to prevail between
delicate-minded turnkeys, and a sensitive prisoner who is to be hanged
next morning; we got on very well, and, all things considered, were
merry enough.
When the morning - THE morning - came, and we met at breakfast, it
was curious to see how eager we all were to prevent a moment's pause
in the conversation, and how astoundingly gay everybody was: the
forced spirits of each member of the little party having as much
likeness to his natural mirth, as hot-house peas at five guineas the quart,
resemble in flavour the growth of the dews, and air, and rain of Heaven.
But as one o'clock, the hour for going aboard, drew near, this volubility
dwindled away by little and little, despite the most persevering efforts
to the contrary, until at last, the matter being now quite desperate, we
threw off all disguise; openly speculated upon where we should be this
time to- morrow, this time next day, and so forth; and entrusted a vast
number of messages to those who intended returning to town that night,
which were to be delivered at home and elsewhere without fail, within
the very shortest possible space of time after the arrival of the railway
train at Euston Square. And commissions and remembrances do so
crowd upon one at such a time, that we were still busied with this
employment when we found ourselves fused, as it were, into a dense
conglomeration of passengers and passengers' friends and passengers'
luggage, all jumbled together on the deck of a small steamboat, and
panting and snorting off to the packet, which had worked out of dock
yesterday afternoon and was now lying at her moorings in the river.
And there she is! all eyes are turned to where she lies, dimly discernible
through the gathering fog of the early winter afternoon; every finger is
pointed in the same direction; and murmurs of interest and admiration -

as 'How beautiful she looks!' 'How trim she is!' - are heard on every
side. Even the lazy gentleman with his hat on one side and his hands in
his pockets, who has dispensed so much consolation by inquiring with
a yawn of another gentleman whether he is 'going across' - as if it were
a ferry - even he condescends to look that way, and nod his head, as
who should say, 'No mistake about THAT:' and not even the sage Lord
Burleigh in his nod, included half so much as this lazy gentleman of
might who has