s, in order that each set of passengers might have space to move
about; for if every one had taken it into their heads to exercise
themselves at the same time, we could hardly have exceeded the
fisherman's definition of a walk, "two steps and overboard." I am
ashamed to say I was more or less ill all the way, but, fortunately,
F---- was not, and I rejoiced at this from the most selfish motives, as
he was able to take care of me. I find that sea-sickness develops the
worst part of one's character with startling rapidity, and, as far as
I am concerned, I look back with self-abasement upon my callous
indifference to the sufferings of others, and apathetic absorption in my
individual misery.

Until we had fairly embarked, the well-meaning but ignorant among our
friends constantly assured us, with an air of conviction as to the truth
and wisdom of their words, that we were going at the very best season
of the year; but as soon as we could gather the opinions of those in
authority on board, it gradually leaked out that we really had fallen
upon quite a wrong time for such a voyage, for we very soon found
ourselves in the tropics during their hottest month (early in August),
and after having been nearly roasted for three weeks, we plunged
abruptly into mid-winter, or at all events very early spring, off the
Cape of Good Hope, and went through a season of bitterly cold weather,
with three heavy gales. I pitied the poor sailors from the bottom of my
heart, at their work all night on decks slippery with ice, and pulling
at ropes so frozen that it was almost impossible to bend them; but,
thank God, there were no casualties among the men. The last gale was the
most severe; they said it was the tail of a cyclone. One is apt on land
to regard such phrases as the "shriek of the storm," or "the roar of
the waves," as poetical hyperboles; whereas they are very literal and
expressive renderings of the sounds of horror incessant throughout
a gale at sea. Our cabin, though very nice and comfortable in other
respects, possessed an extraordinary attraction for any stray wave which
might be wandering about the saloon: once or twice I have been in the
cuddy when a sea found its way down the companion, and I have watched
with horrible anxiety a ton or so of water hesitating which cabin it
should enter and deluge, and it always seemed to choose ours. All these
miseries appear now, after even a few days of the blessed land, to
belong to a distant