sea are lying between us, and the stars that look down on you in your
peaceful English home may see me here on the broad, wide ocean, you are
here safe in my heart, just the same as ever, and my watchful love, that
cannot take care of you as I once did, pours itself out in prayers to the
God who loves us both; for He is my Father and yours, Arthur. We are both
in His hands. He will take care of us now, as we walk on this changing
world, and He will take care of us for ever, in that land where there are
no partings, or sighs, or tears--where the blessed God will joy to bless
us for ever.

"And now I must tell you something about ourselves, about your father and
me. For a little while after we started we had very rough weather; and as
the steamer tossed up and down, and rolled with great heaving swells on
the waves, I was glad that my little boy had a bed to lie on, that did not
heave from side to side. I was glad that the sounds he heard, were the
sweet summer winds rustling, and the birds that sang in the trees, instead
of the creaking and straining noises that I now hear, and that he was
safe, and comfortable, and well; instead of sighing out his poor little
heart with trouble; for sea-sickness is a reality, my little Arthur, as
you would soon find out, if, like me, you had spent some days on the sea,
when the winds had made the waves rough.

"Now the water is calm, and all around us it lies blue and bright, and the
sun makes pleasant sparkles on it, which I look at now and again, as I sit
here on the deck; writing the letter that you will read, and think of me
on my way to the land where you were born.

"I only came on deck yesterday; for, as I told you, the weather was so
rough, and I was so ill, that I had to stay all the time in my cabin. Your
father was as well as ever, indeed he said that he was never better in his
life; and as I lay there for several weary days, I could hear his voice,
now and then talking with the other passengers, and sometimes he would
come in and tell me where we were, and what was the state of the weather,
until at length he was able to tell me that the wind was going down, and
that probably we should have some bright, calm weather; and I was very
glad to think that I should be able to leave my dark cabin, and sit out
where the sun was shining, and where the sea was stretching beneath it,
until it met the spreading sky far away.

"There are a great many ladies and gentlemen on board; som