American Notes | Page 8

strong. The vessel being pretty deep in the
water, with all her coals on board and so many passengers, and the
weather being calm and quiet, there was but little motion; so that before
the dinner was half over, even those passengers who were most
distrustful of themselves plucked up amazingly; and those who in the
morning had returned to the universal question, 'Are you a good sailor?'
a very decided negative, now either parried the inquiry with the evasive
reply, 'Oh! I suppose I'm no worse than anybody else;' or, reckless of
all moral obligations, answered boldly 'Yes:' and with some irritation
too, as though they would add, 'I should like to know what you see in
ME, sir, particularly, to justify suspicion!'
Notwithstanding this high tone of courage and confidence, I could not
but observe that very few remained long over their wine; and that
everybody had an unusual love of the open air; and that the favourite
and most coveted seats were invariably those nearest to the door. The
tea-table, too, was by no means as well attended as the dinner-table;
and there was less whist-playing than might have been expected. Still,
with the exception of one lady, who had retired with some precipitation
at dinner-time, immediately after being assisted to the finest cut of a
very yellow boiled leg of mutton with very green capers, there were no
invalids as yet; and walking, and smoking, and drinking of
brandy-and-water (but always in the open air), went on with unabated
spirit, until eleven o'clock or thereabouts, when 'turning in' - no sailor
of seven hours' experience talks of going to bed - became the order of
the night. The perpetual tramp of boot-heels on the decks gave place to
a heavy silence, and the whole human freight was stowed away below,
excepting a very few stragglers, like myself, who were probably, like
me, afraid to go there.
To one unaccustomed to such scenes, this is a very striking time on
shipboard. Afterwards, and when its novelty had long worn off, it never
ceased to have a peculiar interest and charm for me. The gloom through
which the great black mass holds its direct and certain course; the

rushing water, plainly heard, but dimly seen; the broad, white,
glistening track, that follows in the vessel's wake; the men on the
look-out forward, who would be scarcely visible against the dark sky,
but for their blotting out some score of glistening stars; the helmsman
at the wheel, with the illuminated card before him, shining, a speck of
light amidst the darkness, like something sentient and of Divine
intelligence; the melancholy sighing of the wind through block, and
rope, and chain; the gleaming forth of light from every crevice, nook,
and tiny piece of glass about the decks, as though the ship were filled
with fire in hiding, ready to burst through any outlet, wild with its
resistless power of death and ruin. At first, too, and even when the hour,
and all the objects it exalts, have come to be familiar, it is difficult,
alone and thoughtful, to hold them to their proper shapes and forms.
They change with the wandering fancy; assume the semblance of things
left far away; put on the well-remembered aspect of favourite places
dearly loved; and even people them with shadows. Streets, houses,
rooms; figures so like their usual occupants, that they have startled me
by their reality, which far exceeded, as it seemed to me, all power of
mine to conjure up the absent; have, many and many a time, at such an
hour, grown suddenly out of objects with whose real look, and use, and
purpose, I was as well acquainted as with my own two hands.
My own two hands, and feet likewise, being very cold, however, on
this particular occasion, I crept below at midnight. It was not exactly
comfortable below. It was decidedly close; and it was impossible to be
unconscious of the presence of that extraordinary compound of strange
smells, which is to be found nowhere but on board ship, and which is
such a subtle perfume that it seems to enter at every pore of the skin,
and whisper of the hold. Two passengers' wives (one of them my own)
lay already in silent agonies on the sofa; and one lady's maid (MY
lady's) was a mere bundle on the floor, execrating her destiny, and
pounding her curl- papers among the stray boxes. Everything sloped
the wrong way: which in itself was an aggravation scarcely to be borne.
I had left the door open, a moment before, in the bosom of a gentle
declivity, and, when I turned to shut it, it was on the summit of a lofty
eminence. Now every plank and timber creaked, as if