There were a number of passengers on deck, men, women, and children, and when I ran my eye along the ship (the Grosvenor would have made a neat long-boat for her) and observed her dimensions, I thought that a city might have gone to sea in her without any inconvenience arising from overcrowding. In a word, she was a magnificent Clyde-built iron boat of some four thousand tons burden, and propelled by eight hundred horse-power engines; her decks white as a yacht's, a shining awning forward and aft; a short yellow funnel, towering masts and broad yards, and embodying every conceivable "latest improvement" in compasses, capstans, boat-lowering gear, blocks, gauges, logs, windlass, and the rest of it. She was steaming over a smooth sea and under a glorious blue sky at the rate of thirteen knots, or nearly fifteen miles an hour. Cool draughts of air circled under the awning and fanned my hollow cheeks, and invigorated and refreshed me like cordials.
The captain was on deck when we arrived, and the moment he saw me he came forward and shook my hand, offering me many kindly congratulations on my recovery; and with his own hands placed chairs for me and Mary near the mizzen-mast. Then the chief officer approached, and most, indeed I think all, of the passengers; and I believe that had I been as cynical as old Diogenes I should have been melted into a hearty faith in human nature by the sympathy shown me by these kind people.
They illustrated their goodness best, perhaps, by withdrawing, after a generous salutation, and resuming their various employments or discussions, so as to put me at my ease. The doctor and the chief officer stayed a little while talking to us; and then presently the tiffin-bell rang, and all the passengers went below, the captain having previously suggested that I should remain on deck, so as to get the benefit of the air, and that he would send a steward to wait upon me. Mary would not leave my side; and the officer in charge taking his station on the bridge before the funnel, we, to my great satisfaction, had the deck almost to ourselves.
"You predicted, Mary," I said, "that our lives would be spared. Your dream has come true."
"Yes; I knew my father would not deceive me. Would to God he had been spared!"
"Yet God has been very good to us, Mary. What a change is this, from the deck of the Grosvenor—the seas beating over us, the ship labouring as though at any moment she must go to pieces—ourselves fagged to death, and each of us in our hearts for hours and hours beholding death face to face. I feel as though I had no right to be alive after so much hard work. It is a violation of natural laws and an impertinent triumphing of vitality over the whole forces of Nature."
"But you are alive, dear, and that is all I care about."
I pressed her hand, and after looking around me asked her if she knew whether this vessel went direct to Glasgow.
"Yes."
"Have you any friends there?"