ewn at the
bottom of the sea.

Well, we sailed on and on, always seeming to sail on into pure
cotton-wool, which blushed a little with an evening tint as the sun tired
down, and so here was a long day told off and ending; but where exactly
am I now as darkness falls?

You will say, "Why, the chart tells that, of course;" and so it does, if
you have anything like sure reckoning to indicate what part of the mazy
groups of figures on it to look for as your probable place; otherwise a
dozen different places in it will all suit your soundings, and eleven of
them are wrong.

Consider the _data_, for our calculation. The Rob Roy had been carried
by two tides; one this way, the other that. She had sailed on three
different tacks, that is, in various angular directions, and with
different speeds, and these complicating forces had acted for times very
uncertain. Where is she now? an all-important question for settling the
start point in a night cruise, and on a dangerous coast.

The last time I was sailing in fog was on the Baltic, in my canoe, where,
just at the nick of time, a look-out man was descried on a high ladder
far overlooking the low rocky islands of the Swedish coast, and he
speedily showed me that my bow was then pointed exactly wrong for the
desired haven.

This may be the time, perhaps, to compare the canoe voyages with the yawl
cruise, even if we cannot settle the question so often put to me, "Which
was the most agreeable?"

A canoe voyage can be enjoyed by several men, each in a separate boat,
and yet all in a combined party; that is, with distinct responsibility
but united companionship. The yawl cruise devolves both toil and care on
one alone, but he also has all the pleasure, and so it might be
pronounced at once to be more _selfish_ than the other voyage. But after
a score of tours, in large and small parties, I see that selfishness is
quite independent of the number concerned. A man who is pleasing his
wife or his children in a tour I do not count at all; for everything that
delights or benefits _them_ is of course a pleasure to _him_. Or again,
he may journey with ten companions, and his travelling circle will indeed
be larger, but the centre of it may be after all the same.

Of the thousand tourists who rush out over the Continent each summer
there is little check on selfishness by meeting people in trains,
steamers, and hotels for a temporary acquaintance which is speedily
dissolved as soo