pleasure excursion on Sunday; we could not offer untried stomachs to so
pitiless a sea as that. We must lie still till Monday. And we did. But
we had repetitions of church and prayer-meetings; and so, of course, we
were just as eligibly situated as we could have been any where.

I was up early that Sabbath morning and was early to breakfast. I felt a
perfectly natural desire to have a good, long, unprejudiced look at the
passengers at a time when they should be free from self-consciousness
--which is at breakfast, when such a moment occurs in the lives of human
beings at all.

I was greatly surprised to see so many elderly people--I might almost
say, so many venerable people. A glance at the long lines of heads was
apt to make one think it was all gray. But it was not. There was a
tolerably fair sprinkling of young folks, and another fair sprinkling of
gentlemen and ladies who were non-committal as to age, being neither
actually old or absolutely young.

The next morning we weighed anchor and went to sea. It was a great
happiness to get away after this dragging, dispiriting delay. I thought
there never was such gladness in the air before, such brightness in the
sun, such beauty in the sea. I was satisfied with the picnic then and
with all its belongings. All my malicious instincts were dead within me;
and as America faded out of sight, I think a spirit of charity rose up in
their place that was as boundless, for the time being, as the broad ocean
that was heaving its billows about us. I wished to express my feelings
--I wished to lift up my voice and sing; but I did not know anything to
sing, and so I was obliged to give up the idea. It was no loss to the
ship, though, perhaps.