nged to be with her, and a part of her--to go with her to India,
China, or any where, so that we might rise and fall on the bosom of that
magnificent ocean, and share a part of that glorified existence! That
ocean! that blue, sparkling, heaving, mysterious ocean, with all the
signs and wonders of heaven emblazoned on its bosom, and another world
of mystery hidden beneath its waters! Who would not long to enjoy a
freer communion, and rejoice in a prospect of days spent in unreserved
fellowship with its grand and noble nature?

Alas! what a contrast between all this poetry and the real prose fact of
going to sea! No man, the proverb says, is a hero to his valet de
chambre. Certainly, no poet, no hero, no inspired prophet, ever lost so
much on near acquaintance as this same mystic, grandiloquent old Ocean.
The one step from the sublime to the ridiculous is never taken with such
alacrity as in a sea voyage.

In the first place, it is a melancholy fact, but not the less true, that
ship life is not at all fragrant; in short, particularly on a steamer,
there is a most mournful combination of grease, steam, onions, and
dinners in general, either past, present, or to come, which, floating
invisibly in the atmosphere, strongly predisposes to that disgust of
existence, which, in half an hour after sailing, begins to come upon
you; that disgust, that strange, mysterious, ineffable sensation which
steals slowly and inexplicably upon you; which makes every heaving
billow, every white-capped wave, the ship, the people, the sight, taste,
sound, and smell of every thing a matter of inexpressible loathing! Man
cannot utter it.

It is really amusing to watch the gradual progress of this epidemic; to
see people stepping on board in the highest possible feather, alert,
airy, nimble, parading the deck, chatty and conversable, on the best
possible terms with themselves and mankind generally; the treacherous
ship, meanwhile, undulating and heaving in the most graceful rises and
pauses imaginable, like some voluptuous waltzer; and then to see one
after another yielding to the mysterious spell!

Your poet launches forth, "full of sentiment sublime as billows,"
discoursing magnificently on the color of the waves and the glory of the
clouds; but gradually he grows white about the mouth, gives sidelong
looks towards the stairway; at last, with one desperate plunge, he sets,
to rise no more!

Here sits a stout gentleman, who looks as resolute a