THE VOYAGE.
Thalatta! Thalatta!
I greet thee, thou ocean eternal!
I give thee ten thousand times greeting,
My whole soul exulting!
—Heine.
It was a splendid winter morning, and Boston harbor, with its shipping, presented a magnificent appearance, lighted up by the rising sun, as the "Oceana" steamed out towards the open sea.
Our three friends stood in the after part of the deck, gazing upon the dear native land they were leaving behind them. The professor waited in respectful attendance upon them.
A little way from the shore the signal gun was fired; the farewell gun! how it brought back to the father's memory that moment of agony when the signal gun of another steamer struck the knell of his parting with his only daughter, and seemed to break his heart!
He was going to Claudia now, but oh! how should he find her? Who could tell?
Still there was hope in the thought that he was going to her, and there was exhilaration in the wide expanse of sparkling waters, in the splendid winter sky, in the fresh sea-breeze, and in the swift motion of the steamer.
His eyes, however, with those of all his party, were fixed upon the beloved receding shore; for so smooth as yet was the motion of the steamer that it did not seem to be so much the "Oceana" that was sailing eastward, as the shore that was receding and dropping down below the western horizon.
They stood watching it until all the prominent objects grew gradually indistinct and became blended in each other; then until the dimly diversified boundary faded into a faint irregular blue line; then until it vanished. Only then they left the deck and went down into the cabin to explore their staterooms.
Ishmael found the professor, who had gone down a few minutes before him, busy unpacking his master's sea trunk, and getting him, as he said: