NARRATIVE

OF A

TOUR

IN

NORTH AMERICA.

LETTER I.

Voyage across the Atlantic-Emigrants-Hail-storms - Two Atheists on board-Banks of Newfoundland-Fogs-Icebergs-Fishing for Mackerel—Whales — News-boats Sandy Hook-New York Bay-Dinner at the City Hotel.

New York, United States of America,

MY DEAR Friend,

5th June, 1831.

IN fulfilment of the promise which I made to you, on quitting England for the shores of the New World, to give you a faithful narrative of my adventures, I now draw forth my bestpointed Bramah, on the continent of America, in order to redeem my pledge. And as I know your curiosity ranges over the sea as over the

land, and that a voyage across the great deep will have more of novelty for you than an excursion by land, I shall commence my letter by giving you a slight sketch of my passage across the Atlantic.

I sailed from Portsmouth, on the 2d of May, on board of the Hannibal, one of the New York packet-ships, which, for accommodation, elegance, excellent fare, kind treatment, and good seamanship, are quite equal to any ships that navigate the ocean. Our vessel was something short of 500 tons, and was commanded by Captain Hebard, a very attentive and obliging American; and our society on board consisted of about twentyfour cabin passengers, making up the full complement for which berths could be supplied. In addition, however, to the company here enumerated, there were about a hundred unhappy emigrants crowded together in the steerage, who were hastening to seek that better lot in a strange and distant land which they had failed to realise in their own. They presented an interesting, but mournful, picture of a population redundant beyond the means of support; driven away from country and friends, through the resistless influence of moral and physical causes, to seek subsistence and a home perchance in the wilderness.

Our voyage commenced under rather inauspicious circumstances; since, in addition to the adverse wind with which we left the harbour of

Portsmouth, we encountered, in the Channel, a succession of the most violent and tempestuous hail-storms that I ever remember to have seen. The deck of the ship was so completely and profusely covered with hail and snow, drifted in some places into large heaps, that the gentlemen acted over again the days of their schoolboy feats, and pelted each other with snow-balls. Such weather as this on the 2d of May, and off the mild and temperate coast of Devon, excited in no small degree our surprise, and compelled us to wrap our cloaks around us, when in truth we might have expected to throw them aside altogether.

The sea, as you are aware, agrees with me extremely well, having traversed every ocean on the globe without having once experienced the dreadful sensation of sea-sickness; dreadful, according to the report of others, and which I am, as with respect also to the toothache, much happier to learn at second than at first hand. The boundless mass of waters, too, on which I was just entering, awfully magnificent and passingly wonderful as it is, always rivets my attention, whether sailing on its blue expanse or sauntering along its shores, and ever presents to my mind an unfailing source of grateful and sublime contemplation. I never behold this glorious object without having the beautiful passage of the Psalmist most forcibly recalled to my memory :-" They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business

66

land, and that a voyage across the great deep will have more of novelty for you than an excursion by land, I shall commence my letter by giving you a slight sketch of my passage across the Atlantic.

I sailed from Portsmouth, on the 2d of May, on board of the Hannibal, one of the New York packet-ships, which, for accommodation, elegance, excellent fare, kind treatment, and good seamanship, are quite equal to any ships that navigate the ocean. Our vessel was something short of 500 tons, and was commanded by Captain Hebard, a very attentive and obliging American; and our society on board consisted of about twentyfour cabin passengers, making up the full complement for which berths could be supplied. In addition, however, to the company here enumerated, there were about a hundred unhappy emigrants crowded together in the steerage, who were hastening to seek that better lot in a strange and distant land which they had failed to realise in their own. They presented an interesting, but mournful, picture of a population redundant beyond the means of support; driven away from country and friends, through the resistless influence of moral and physical causes, to seek subsistence and a home perchance in the wilderness.

Our voyage commenced under rather inauspicious circumstances; since, in addition to the adverse wind with which we left the harbour of

Portsmouth, we encountered, in the Channel, a succession of the most violent and tempestuous hail-storms that I ever remember to have seen. The deck of the ship was so completely and profusely covered with hail and snow, drifted in some places into large heaps, that the gentlemen acted over again the days of their schoolboy feats, and pelted each other with snow-balls. Such weather as this on the 2d of May, and off the mild and temperate coast of Devon, excited in no small degree our surprise, and compelled us to wrap our cloaks around us, when in truth we might have expected to throw them aside altogether.

The sea, as you are aware, agrees with me extremely well, having traversed every ocean on the globe without having once experienced the dreadful sensation of sea-sickness; dreadful, according to the report of others, and which I am, as with respect also to the toothache, much happier to learn at second than at first hand. The boundless mass of waters, too, on which I was just entering, awfully magnificent and passingly wonderful as it is, always rivets my attention, whether sailing on its blue expanse or sauntering along its shores, and ever presents to my mind an unfailing source of grateful and sublime contemplation. I never behold this glorious object without having the beautiful passage of the Psalmist most forcibly recalled to my memory :—“ They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business