ny--only thirty-three in all. Few amateurs
travel at this inclement season. I knew only one other Englishman on
board, an officer in the Rifle Brigade, returning to Canada from
sick-leave. Among the Americans was Cyrus Field, the energetic promoter
of the Atlantic Telegraph, then making (I think he said) his thirtieth
transit within five years. He was certainly entitled to the freedom of
the ocean, if intimate acquaintance with every fathom of its depth and
breadth could establish a claim. It rather surprised me, afterwards, to
see such science and experience yield so easily to the common weakness
of seafaring humanity. Mr. Field told me that throughout the fearful
weather to which the Niagara and Agamemnon were exposed, on their first
attempt to lay down the cable, he never once felt a sensation of nausea;
the body had not time to suffer till the mind was relieved from its
heavy, anxious strain.

For three days after leaving Queenstown, the west winds met us, steady
and strong; but it was not till the afternoon of Christmas day that the
sea began to "get up" in earnest, and the weather to portend a gale.
Then, the Atlantic seemed determined to prove that report had not
exaggerated the hardships of a winter passage. It blew harder and harder
all Friday, and after a brief lull on Saturday--as though gathering
breath for the final onset--the storm fairly reached its height, and
then slowly abated, leaving us substantial tokens of its visit in the
shape of shattered boats, and the ruin of all our port bulwarks forward
of the deck-house. I fancy there was nothing extraordinary in the
tempest; and, in a stout ship, with plenty of sea room, there is
probably little real danger; but about the intense discomfort there
could be no question. I speak with no undue bitterness, for of nausea,
in any shape, I know of little or nothing, but--oh, mine enemy!--if I
could feel certain you were well out in the Atlantic, experiencing, for
just one week, the weather that fell to our lot, I would abate much of
my animosity, purely from satiation of revenge.

Unless absolutely prostrated by illness, the voyager, of course, has a
ravenous appetite; such being the case, what can be more exasperating
than having to grapple with a sort of dioramic dinner, where the dishes
represent a series of dissolving views--mutton and beef of mature age,
leaping about with a playfulness only becoming living lambs and
calves--while the proverb of "cup and lip