cumscribed, ventilation was inadequate,
and the cook's galley pungent. Finally the United States mail was passed
on deck, the last loiterer was on board, the gangway was hauled on to
the wharf by the stevedores; the engine gave three distressing whistles,
not clear and sharp, but asthmatic ones, as though not having clearly
made up its mind to whistle at all; the pilot took his station on the
bridge, and the screw began to revolve. The bow-line was let go, so that
the ship might swing by her stern hawser well clear of the wharf, then
the order to let go the stern line was shouted, and we had literally
bidden good-by to America for many a long month.

Presently, when we passed through the narrow strait known as the Golden
Gate, and laid our course westward, we began to realize that five
thousand miles of ocean flowed between us and the shore towards which we
were steering. One is apt to have some serious reflections on such an
occasion. What lay before us in the many thousand miles of land and
ocean travel? What perils and experiences were to be encountered? Who
could say that we should all, or indeed any of us, live to return to our
several homes? At San Francisco our company was augmented by the
addition of an Englishman, Mr. D----, of London, a stranger to us, but
who came thither to join the party, making our number six in all.

Hundreds of large white sea-gulls hovered over and about the ship, as we
lay our course due west. The harbor of Sail Francisco swarms with these
marine birds, and a score of them followed the ship after the pilot left
us. As we were watching them, an officer of the Belgic remarked: "They
will follow us across the Pacific;" and certainly that number of
sea-gulls actually appeared to do so, though whether they were always
the same birds, it would be impossible to say. The flight of a sea-gull
at times exceeds twenty miles an hour, while the Belgic, at her maximum
speed, scarcely exceeded half that; and thus these swift-winged
creatures often flew far ahead of the ship, but soon settled back again
to watch our wake, from whence they got their food supply.

There were twenty-five cabin passengers, and about three hundred Chinese
in the steerage. The latter were returning home after some years of
labor and saving in this country, for few if any of them emigrate except
with a fixed purpose of returning to the Celestial Empire sooner or
later. The purser of the ship informed us that there was not o