CHAPTER VIII.
MAST-HEADING A YOUNG GENTLEMAN.
On the 8th of January, 1804, we sailed from Halifax, and, after a long and tedious passage, arrived at Bermuda. The transition from the intense frost of a Nova Scotian winter, during which the mercury was generally below zero, to a temperature of 70° or 80°, was exceedingly agreeable to those who had constitutions to stand the sudden rise of more than half a hundred degrees of the thermometer. After a few days’ stay at Bermuda, we set off for the United States, where we were again frozen, almost as much as we had been at Halifax. The first land we made was that of Virginia; but owing to calms, and light foul winds, we failed in getting to Norfolk in the Chesapeak, and therefore bore up for New York, which we reached on the 19th of February, and there anchored about seven miles from that beautiful city.
It was not thought right to let any of us young folks visit the shore alone; but I was fortunate in being invited to accompany one of the officers. To the friendship of this most excellent person, at the periods of most need, I feel so much more indebted than I can venture to express without indelicacy, that I shall say nothing of the gratitude I have so long borne him in return. Perhaps, indeed, the best, as being the most practical, repayment we can ever make for such attentions is, to turn them over, again and again, to some other person similarly circumstanced with ourselves at those early periods. This would be acting in the spirit with which Dr. Franklin tells us he used to lend money, as he never gave it away without requiring from the person receiving such assistance, a promise to repay the loan, not to himself, but to transfer it, when times improved, to some one else in distress, who would enter into the same sort of engagement to circulate the charity. On this principle, I have several times, in the course of my professional life, rather surprised young middies by giving them exactly such a lift as I myself received at New York—shewing them strange places, and introducing them to the inhabitants, in the way my kind friend adopted towards me. These boys may perhaps have fancied it was owing to their own uncommon merit that they were so noticed; while all the time I may have merely been relieving my own conscience, and paying off, by indirect instalments, a portion of that debt of gratitude which, in spite of these disbursements, I find only increases in proportion as my knowledge of the world gives me the means of appreciating its value.
That it is the time and manner of doing a kindness which constitute its chief merit, as a matter of feeling at least, is quite true; and the grand secret of this delicate art appears to consist in obliging people just at the moments, and, as nearly as possible, in the particular way, in which they themselves wish the favour to be done. However perverse their tastes may be, and often, perhaps, because they are perverse, people do not like even to have favours thrust upon them. But it was my good fortune on this, and many other occasions in life, early and late, to fall in with friends who always contrived to nick the right moments to a hair’s-breadth. Accordingly, one morning, I received an invitation to accompany my generous friend, one of the lieutenants, to New York, and I felt, as he spoke, a bound of joy, the bare recollection of which makes my pulse beat ten strokes per minute quicker, at the distance of a good quarter of a century!
It would not be fair to the subject, nor indeed quite so to myself, to transcribe from a very boyish journal an account of this visit to New York. The inadequate expression of that period, compared with the vivid recollection of what I then felt, shews, well enough, the want of power which belongs to inexperience. Very fortunately, however, the faculty of enjoying is sooner acquired than the difficult art of describing. Yet even this useful and apparently simple science of making the most of all that turns up, requires a longer apprenticeship of good fortune than most people are aware of.
In the midst of snow and wind, we made out a very comfortless passage to New York; and, after some trouble in hunting for lodgings, we were well pleased to find ourselves snugly stowed away in a capital boarding house in Greenwich Street. We there found a large party at tea before a blazing wood fire, which was instantly piled with fresh logs for the strangers, and the best seats relinquished for them, according to the invariable practice of that hospitable country.
If our hostess be still alive, I hope she will not repent of having bestowed her obliging attentions on one who, so many years afterwards, made himself, he fears, less popular in her land, than he could wish to be amongst a people to whom he owes so much, and for whom he really feels so much kindness. He still anxiously hopes, however, they will believe him when he declares, that, having said in his recent publication no more than what he conceived was due to strict truth, and to the integrity of history, as far as his observations and opinions went, he still feels, as he always has, and ever must continue to feel towards America, the heartiest good-will.
The Americans are perpetually repeating, that the foundation-stone of their liberty is fixed on the doctrine, that every man is free to form his own opinions, and to promulgate them in candour and in moderation. Is it meant that a foreigner is excluded from these privileges? If not, may I ask, in what respect have I passed these limitations? The Americans have surely no fair right to be offended because my views differ from theirs; and yet, I am told, I have been rudely enough handled by the press of that country. If my motives are distrusted, I can only say I am sorely belied; if I am mistaken, regret at my political blindness were surely more dignified than anger on the part of those with whom I differ; and if it shall chance that I am in the right, the best confirmation of the correctness of my views, in the opinion of indifferent persons, will perhaps be found in the soreness of those who wince when the truth is spoken.
Yet, after all, few things would give me more real pleasure than to know that my friends across the water would consent to take me at my word; and, considering what I have said about them as so much public matter—which it truly is—agree to reckon me in my absence, as they always did when I was amongst them—and I am sure they would count me if I went back again—as a private friend. I differed with them in politics, and I differ with them now as much as ever; but I sincerely wish them happiness individually; and as a nation, I shall rejoice if they prosper. As the Persians write, “What can I say more?” And I only hope these few words may help to make my peace with people who justly pride themselves on bearing no malice. As for myself, I have no peace to make; for I have studiously avoided reading any of the American criticisms on my book, in order that the kindly feelings I have ever entertained towards that country should not be ruffled. By this abstinence, I may have lost some information, and perhaps missed many opportunities of correcting erroneous impressions. But I set so much store by the pleasing recollection of the journey itself, and of the hospitality with which my family were every where received, that, whether it be right, or whether it be wrong, I cannot bring myself to read any thing which might disturb these agreeable associations. So let us part in peace! or rather, let us meet again in cordial communication; and if this little work shall find its way across the Atlantic, I hope it will be read there without reference to any thing that has passed between us; or, at all events, with reference only to those parts of our former intercourse which are satisfactory to all parties.
After leaving the American coast, we stood once more across the gulf stream for Bermuda. Here I find the first trace of a regular journal, containing a few of those characteristic touches which, when we are sure of their being actually made on the spot, however carelessly, carry with them an easy, familiar kind of interest, that rarely belongs to the efforts of memory alone. It is, indeed, very curious how much the smallest memorandums sometimes serve to lighten up apparently forgotten trains of thought, and to bring vividly before the imagination scenes long past, and to recall turns of expression, and even the very look with which these expressions were uttered, though every circumstance connected with them may have slept in the mind for a long course of years.