In the America, as it was a winter-passage, few persons chose to walk on deck after dinner, consequently the saloon from eight till eleven presented the appearance of a room at a fashionable hotel. There were two regularly organised whist-parties, which played rubbers ad infinitum. Cards indeed were played at most of the tables—some played backgammon—a few would doze over odd volumes of old novels—while three chess-boards would be employed at a time, for there were ten persons perfectly devoted to this noble game. The varied employments of the occupants of the saloon produced a strange mixture of conversations. One evening, while waiting the slow movements of an opponent at chess, the following remarks in slightly raised tones were audible above the rest:—"Do you really think me pretty?—Oh flattering man!—Deuce, ace—Treble, double, and rub— That's a good hand—Check—It's your play—You've gammoned me—Ay, ay, sir—Parbleu!—Holloa! steward, whisky-toddy for four—I totally despise conventionalisms—Checkmate—Brandy-punch for six—You've thrown away all your hearts"—and a hundred others, many of them demands for something from the culinary department. Occasionally a forlorn wight, who neither played chess nor cards, would venture on deck to kill time, and return into the saloon panting and shivering, in rough surtout and fur cap, bringing a chilly atmosphere with him, voted a bore for leaving the door open, and totally unable to induce people to sympathise with him in his complaints of rain, cold, or the "ugly night." By eleven the saloon used to become almost unbearable, from the combined odours of roast onions, pickles, and punch, and at half-past the lights were put out, and the company dispersed, most to their berths, but some to smoke cigars on deck.
Though the Cunard steamers are said by English people to be as near perfection as steamers can be, I was sorry not to return in a clipper. There is something so exhilarating in the motion of a sailing-vessel, always provided she is neither rolling about in a calm, lying to in a gale, or beating against a head-wind. She seems to belong to the sea, with her tall tapering masts, her cloud of moving canvas, and her buoyant motion over the rolling waves. Her movements are all comprehensible, and above-board she is invariably clean, and her crew are connected in one's mind with nautical stories which charmed one in the long-past days of youth. A steamer is very much the reverse. "Sam Slick," with his usual force and aptitude of illustration, says that "she goes through the water like a subsoil-plough with an eight-horse team." There is so much noise and groaning, and smoke and dirt, so much mystery also, and the ship leaves so much commotion in the water behind her. There do not seem to be any regular sailors, and in their stead a collection of individuals remarkably greasy in their appearance, who may be cooks or stokers, or possibly both. Then you cannot go on the poop without being saluted by a whiff of hot air from the grim furnaces below; men are always shovelling in coal, or throwing cinders overboard; and the rig does not seem to belong to any ship in particular. The masts are low and small, and the canvas, which is always spread in fair weather, looks as if it had been trailed along Cheapside on a wet day. In the America it was not such a very material assistance either; for on one occasion, when we were running before a splendid breeze under a crowd of sail, the engines were stopped and the log heaved, which only gave our speed at three miles an hour. One lady passenger had been feeding her mind with stories of steamboat explosions in the States, and spent her time in a morbid state of terror by no means lessened by the close proximity of her state-room to the dreaded engine.
On the sixth day after leaving Halifax the wind, which everybody had been hoping for or fearing, came upon us at last, and continued increasing for three days, when, if we had been beating against it, we should have called it a hurricane. It was, however, almost directly aft, and we ran before it under sail. The sky during the two days which it lasted was perfectly cloudless, and the sea had that peculiar deep, clear, greenish-blue tint only to be met with far from land. There was a majesty, a sublimity about the prospect from the poop exceeding everything which I had ever seen. There was the mighty ocean showing his power, and here were we poor insignificant creatures overcoming him by virtue of those heaven sent arts by which man
"Has made fire, flood, and earth,
The vassals of his will."
I had often read of mountain waves, but believed the comparison to be a mere figure of speech till I saw them here, all glorious in their beauty, under the clear blue of a December sky. Two or three long high hills of water seemed to fill up the whole horizon, themselves an aggregate of a countless number of leaping, foam-capped waves, each apparently large enough to overwhelm a ship. Huge green waves seemed to chase us, when, just as they reached the stern, the ship would lift, and they would pass under her. She showed especial capabilities for rolling. She would roll down on one side, the billows seeming ready to burst in foam over her, while the opposite bulwark was fifteen or eighteen feet above the water, displaying her bright green copper. The nights were more glorious than the days, when the broad full moon would shed her light upon the water with a brilliancy unknown in our foggy clime. It did not look like a wan flat surface, placed flat upon a watery sky, but like a large radiant sphere hanging in space. The view from the wheel-house was magnificent. The towering waves which came up behind us heaped together by mighty winds, looked like hills of green glass, and the phosphorescent light like fiery lamps within—the moonlight glittered upon our broad foamy wake—our masts and spars and rigging stood out in sharp relief against the sky, while for once our canvas looked white. Far in the distance the sharp bow would plunge down into the foam, and then our good ship, rising, would shake her shiny sides, as if in joy at her own buoyancy. The busy hum of men marred not the solitary sacredness of midnight on the Atlantic. The moon "walked in brightness," auroras flashed, and meteors flamed, and a sensible presence of Deity seemed to pervade the transparent atmosphere in which we were viewing "the works of the Lord, and his wonders in the deep."
I could scarcely understand how this conjunction of circumstances could produce any but agreeable sensations; but it is a melancholy fact that the saloon emptied and the state-rooms filled, and the number of promenaders daily diminished. People began to find the sea "an unpleasant fact." I heard no more Byronic quotations about its "glad waters," or comments on the "splendid run"—these were changed into anxious questions as to when we should reach Liverpool? and, if we were in danger? People querulously complained of the ale, hitherto their delight; abused the meat; thought the mulligatawny "horrid stuff;" and wondered how they could ever have thought plum-puddings fit for anything but pigs. Mysterious disappearances were very common; diligent peripatetics were seen extended on sofas, or feebly promenading under shelter of the bulwarks; while persons who prided themselves on their dignity sustained ignominious falls, or clung to railings in a state of tottering decrepitude, in an attempted progress down the saloon. Though we had four ledges on the tables, cruets, bottles of claret, and pickles became locomotive, and jumped upon people's laps; almost everything higher than a plate was upset—pickles, wine, ale, and oil forming a most odoriferous mixture; but these occurrences became too common to be considered amusing. Two days before reaching England the gale died away, and we sighted Cape Clear at eight o'clock on the evening of the eleventh day out. A cold chill came off from the land, we were enveloped in a damp fog, and the inclemency of the air reminded us of what we had nearly forgotten, namely, that we were close upon Christmas.
The greater part of Sunday we were steaming along in calm water, within sight of the coast of Ireland, and extensive preparations were being made for going ashore—some people of sanguine dispositions had even decided what they would order for dinner at the Adelphi. Morning service was very fully attended, and it was interesting to hear the voices of people of so many different creeds and countries joining in that divinely-taught prayer which proclaims the universal brotherhood of the human race, knowing that in a few hours those who then met in adoration would be separated, to meet no more till summoned by the sound of the last trumpet.
Those who expected to spend Sunday night on shore were disappointed. A gale came suddenly on us about four o'clock, sails were hastily taken in, orders were hurriedly given and executed, and the stewards were in despair, when a heavy lurch of the ship threw most of the things off the table before dinner, mingling cutlery, pickles, and broken glass and china, in one chaotic heap on the floor. As darkness came on, the gale rose higher, the moon was obscured, the rack in heavy masses was driving across the stormy sky, and scuds of sleet and spray made the few venturous persons on deck cower under the nearest shelter to cogitate the lines—
"Nights like these,
When the rough winds wake western seas,
Brook not of glee."
I might dwell upon the fury of that night—upon the awful blasts which seemed about to sweep the seas of every human work—upon our unanswered signals—upon the length of time while we were