The first two weeks were rendered tedious by contrary winds and calms, but during the rest of the passage the breezes seemed to blow on purpose to forward us; and at length, on the 1st June, we beheld the high land of Erin bearing exactly as our Captain[72] had calculated; indeed it is but justice to him to say that his lunar and other observations were throughout correct. He is a brave and worthy man from whom we experienced every polite attention to comfort during the passage. We now bore up the channel with a strong but favourable breeze, and passing Holyhead took in a pilot, and the following morning the Factor was brought safely into dock at Liverpool (in a hard gale however,) in twenty-four days from leaving Delaware Bay.
[224] Having arrived in terrâ cognitâ again, I think it the proper place to take leave of the reader. Should Fortune, unpropitious at home—the spirit of enterprise—or any other motive, ever induce him to seek the shores of Columbia, he has my best wishes for success, if he shall deserve them; and should any of the hints here given prove conducive to it, my end is answered. And let Americans cease to show anger at the observations of those travellers who have visited their country: though unfavourable the reports we give, they are the best proofs of the friendly interest we take in their welfare, and of the hopes we entertain of what they may in time become. Their soreness upon the mention of their faults is truly unreasonable, for they are such as they may amend. The man who should laugh at a blind eye or a wooden leg would be silly and illiberal; but if satire is levelled at curable failings the wise will take it in good part.
FINIS
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The number of passages to America already published might, in the opinion of some, be a reason for suppressing this; it is hoped however, that it will not be found altogether useless or uninteresting.—Welby.
[2] The Ship had grounded upon the Margate Sands; always dangerous, owing to their constantly shifting with the tide: just before our own misfortune, we had seen an homeward-bound East Indiaman aground and lightening her cargo into small craft.—Welby.
[3] Cobbing is a punishment inflicted by tying the culprit to the windlass, when each man in turn gives him two or three blows with the flat side of the carpenter's saw.—Welby.
[4] Let me here caution any passenger against offering money to a custom-house officer on this side the water; they are well paid, and do not take money, as in other countries, to betray the interests of the government, that they may live.—Welby.
[5] The charge here, at any one of the City taverns, for cleaning a pair of boots, is a quarter dollar (13½ d. of our money).—Welby.