At 6 P.M. accordingly we steamed out of the Bay of St. Thomas. On the present occasion the Magdalena had 163 passengers on board, the majority of whom were planters from the various West India islands, bound on a pleasure trip during the hot season. Not merely the black servants, but even their white and chocolate-coloured masters, broke out into the most marvellous English or French jargon, according as they came from Jamaica and Demerara, from Martinique, Guadaloupe, or Hayti. The presence of a great number of children, who, so long as they kept free of sea-sickness, evidently considered the whole of the quarter-deck as especially designed for them to play on, in which notion they were zealously upheld by their mothers and their nurses, made the passage anything but agreeable. Moreover, the impression made by the grown-up passengers was such as to heighten one's aspirations for a speedy voyage. The intelligence which had been received from the seat of war in Italy gave rise to much excitement, and within the first twelve hours had made it apparent
that it was vain to hope for a pleasant voyage. Nothing was heard on every side but politics, and it may be left to the reader to guess in what tone they would be discussed, when Frenchmen, heated with visions of la gloire militaire, were the principal spokesmen.
Early the next morning we were near the reef, which had disabled the largest and finest of the Company's ships, that had just cost £140,000. The unfortunate ship had struck the reef when running 11 knots an hour, and now lay on her starboard side on the reef, having careened so far over that her port paddle-wheel was quite clear of the water. A committee on the spot having decided that she must be entirely dismantled before even her bare hull could be got off the reef, it was resolved not to detain the Magdalena, it being thought desirable that she should as speedily as possible make her way to Southampton, so as to enable the directors at once to determine what course to adopt, before the sailing of the next steamer. Our captain was furnished with a general account of the accident, together with a sketch by the head engineer of the position of the Paramatta, and with these the Magdalena was permitted to take her departure.
The voyage threatened to be long and tedious, though attempts were made to enliven the mornings and evenings by music, and an occasional dance on deck. The former might have been made very agreeable, had not the chef d'orchestre, who was second steward, ventured on playing his own compositions as often as possible. To please the susceptibilities of
the two nationalities, God save the Queen and Partant pour la Syrie were regularly called for each night. A more serious cause of alarm was the fear lest we should have to put into some intermediate port to coal. When she left St. Thomas the Magdalena had 1200 tons on board, but as, notwithstanding constant calms and a sea like a mill-pond, she never made above 190 to 220 miles in the early part of the voyage, at a consumption of 70 tons per day, there seemed every prospect of our exhausting our supply. As she consumed her stock, however, she lightened perceptibly, till she even got up to the for her unusual speed of 280 miles a day. How different from the same Company's ships Atrato and La Plata, which frequently make 340 miles a day, and in fact average only 13 days on the passage home, while the average of the Magdalena and her consorts is 18 days!
At last, on 18th July, we sighted the Lizard's. Although barely 200 miles from our destination, the captain thought it best to put into the nearest port for a supply of coal, and shortly after noon we anchored in Falmouth Harbour, where the first intelligence we got was that peace had been concluded. Singular to say, even this intelligence produced no accession of harmony between the two great political parties on board. As for myself, I had kept as much as possible by myself; and now stepping ashore, I wandered through the narrow dirty streets of Falmouth, which presents the accurate type of the old-fashioned English provincial town. The meadows and sloping hills around shone forth in all the fresh
verdure of spring. Even the traveller fresh from the voluptuous loveliness of the tropics, finds ever new beauties in the manifold variety of nature. The more the student of Nature walks with her and finds in her his chief pleasures, the more receptive does his soul become for all that is marvellous and beautiful, as from day to day they present themselves in new and unexpected phases.
The same evening the Magdalena resumed her voyage, and about noon on the 19th we passed the renowned "Needles," and in two hours afterwards reached Southampton. Dire was the confusion on board, each person wishing to have his own trunk conveyed on shore the first. I found with my voluminous boxes the most courteous consideration. It sufficed to explain the object of my travels to have all my luggage passed without examination. For down to the English Custom House officials, who are not, it must be confessed, prone to show much tenderness to travellers' baggage, extends that honourable feeling of respect for science which Englishmen of all grades seem to entertain. The same evening I reached London.
As the next steamer for Gibraltar was not to leave for eight days, I immediately started to London, and availed myself of this opportunity to renew old acquaintance, and make up my leeway as regarded the important strides and valuable discoveries made in the fields of science during my long absence from Europe. The warm interest and cordial reception I met with from such gentlemen as Sir Roderick
Murchison, General Sabine, Sir Charles Lyell, Professor Owen, Dr. Gray, Mr. Henry Reeve, Mr. Crawford, Mr. John Murray, Mr. Ellis, and many others, was the most gratifying and conclusive evidence of the interest and high expectations which the Novara Expedition had excited among scientific circles in England.