is so great occasion magnanimity of soul will be
possible even to me. I will consider my neighbors and be wise. At one
end of the long saloon a banquet-board was spread. Its hospitality was,
like the other attractions of the Jane Moseley, a perfidious pageant.
Nobody sought its soup or claimed its clams. One or two sad-eyed young
men made their way in that direction from time to time--after their
sea-legs, perhaps. From their gait when they came back I inferred they
did not find them. The human nature in the saloon became a weariness to
me. Even the gentle gambols of the dog Thaddeus, a sportive and spotted
pointer in whom I had been interested, failed to soothe my perturbed
spirits. De Quincey speaks somewhere of "the awful solitariness of every
human soul." No wonder, then, that I should be solitary among the
festive few on board the Jane Moseley--no wonder I felt myself darkly,
deeply, desperately blue. I thought I would go on deck. I clung to my
companion with an ardor which would have been flattering had it been
voluntary. My faltering steps were guided to a seat just within the
guards. I sat there thinking that I had never nursed a dear gazelle, so
I could not be quite sure whether it would have died or not, but I
thought it would. I mused on the changing fortunes of this unsteady
world, and the ingratitude of man. I thought it would be easier going to
the Promised Land if Jordan did not roll between. Rolling had long
ceased to be a pleasant figure of speech with me. How frail are all
things here below, how false, and yet how fair! My mind is naturally
picturesque. In the midst of my sadness the force of nature compelled me
to grope after an illustration. I could only think that my own foothold
was frail, that the Jane Moseley was false, that the Pretty Girl was
fair. A dizziness of brain resulted from this rhetorical effort. I
silently confided my sorrows to the sympathizing bosom of the sea. I was
soothed by the kindred melancholy of the sad sea waves. If the size of
the waves were remarkable, other sighs abounded also, and other things
waved--many of them.

True to my purpose of studying my fellow-beings, and learning wisdom by
observation, I surveyed the Pretty Girl and her sister, who had by that
time come on deck. They were surrounded by a group of audacious male
creatures, who surrounded most on the side where the Pretty Girl sat.
She did not look feeble. She was like the red, red rose. It was a
conundrum t