A “WHITE STAR” LINER CROSSING THE ATLANTIC.

BY
F. WHYMPER,
AUTHOR OF “TRAVELS IN ALASKA,” ETC.

CONTENTS.

[pg vii]

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

[pg 1]

THE SEA.

CHAPTER I.

The Great Atlantic Ferry.

The “Grand Tour” of Former Days—The only Grand Tour left—Round the World in Eighty Days—Fresh-water Sailors and Nautical Ladies—Modern Steamships and their Speed—The Orient—Rivals—Routes round the Globe—Sir John Mandeville on the Subject—Difficulties in some Directions—The Great Atlantic Ferry—Dickens’s Experiences—Sea Sickness—Night at Sea—The Ship Rights—And then Wrongs—A Ridiculous Situation—Modern First-class Accommodation—The Woes of the Steerage—Mark Tapley—Immense Emigration of Third-class Passengers—Discomfort and Misery—Efforts to Improve the Steerage—“Intermediate”—Castle Gardens, New York—Voyage safer than by the Bay of Biscay—The Chimborazo in a Hurricane.

“Come, all ye jovial sailors,

And listen unto me,

While I do sing the troubles

Of those that plough the sea.”

We all know what the “Grand Tour” meant a few generations ago, and how without it no gentleman’s education was considered complete. Now-a-days the journey can be made by almost any one who can command thirty or forty pounds, and the only really grand tour left is that around [pg 2]the world. M. Verne tells us—inferentially, at all events—that it can be made in eighty days, while Puck, as we know, speaks of putting a “girdle round the earth in forty minutes.” But this statement of the popular French author, like many others put forth in his graphic and picturesque works, must be taken cum grano salis. It could be, undoubtedly, but it is very questionable whether any one has yet accomplished the feat. Could one ensure the absolute “connection” as it is technically termed, of all the steamship lines which would have to be employed it might be done; or better, one vessel with grand steaming and sailing qualities might perform the “Voyage Round the World” in the given time. But M. Jules Verne, it will be remembered, paints his hero as landing at various points, and as performing acts of bravery and chivalry en route, such as the episode of rescuing a Hindoo widow from the Suttee; finding time to lounge and drink in San Francisco “saloons,” and being attacked by Indians, who would wreck the overland train; and still, with all delays, he is able to reach London in time to win his wager. The very idea of describing a journey round the world as an act of eccentricity is peculiarly French. The Englishman who can afford to make it is especially envied by his friends, and not considered mildly mad. We have before us a list of books of travel, all published within the last few years, and in circulation at the ordinary libraries. Thirteen of these works describe voyages round the world, and they are mostly the productions of amateur rather than of professional writers. So easy, indeed, is the trip now-a-days, that two of these records are modestly and deprecatingly described as “Rambles,” while one of the best of them is the work of a clever and enthusiastic lady,[1] whose excellent husband, in and out of Parliament, has earnestly and persistently studied “poor Jack’s” best interests. This lady is evidently no fresh-water sailor, and would put to shame the land-lubber described in a very old song:—

“A tar, all pitch, did loudly bawl, sir,

‘All hands aloft!’—‘Sweet sir, not I.

Though drowning I don’t fear at all, sir,

I hate a rope exceedingly.’”[2]

Another work, by a young lady in her teens, is entitled, “By Land and Ocean; or, the Journals and Letters of a Young Girl who went to South Australia with a Lady, thence alone to Victoria, New Zealand, Sydney, Singapore, China, Japan, and across the Continent of America.” Perhaps the most remarkable, however, of modern female travellers is a German lady,[3] who left Paris with only seven and a half francs in her pocket, and yet managed to go round the entire globe. It must be admitted that she had many friends abroad who helped her, and passed her on to others who could and did assist her in every way. Still, the voyages and travels she made denote the possession of a goodly amount of pluck.

The item of speed is of great importance, and may well be considered in connection with a voyage round the globe. Verne’s title would have been deemed the raving of a [pg 3]lunatic had it been published before the age of steam, while in the first days of that great power which has now revolutionised the world it would have been regarded as absurd. The wooden Cunarder which, forty years ago, conveyed Charles Dickens on his first trip to America took double the ordinary time occupied now in making the voyage; and as a journalist has said, between such a vessel “and such ships as the Arizona (Guion line), the Germanic (White Star line), the City of Berlin (Inman line), and the Gallia (Allan line), there is undoubtedly not less difference than between the Edinburgh or Glasgow mail-coaches and a modern express train.” The Arizona has made the round trip—that is, the voyage from Queenstown, Ireland, to Sandy Hook, New York, and back again—in fifteen days. The Inman line has been specially celebrated for quick passages, whilst their “crack” steamer, the City of Berlin, has made the single trip outwards in seven days, fourteen hours, and twelve minutes, and inwards in seven days, fifteen hours, and forty-eight minutes. The City of Brussels and the City of Richmond have done nearly as well, while other steamships of the same line have made the trip in a very few hours and minutes more time. Think of considering minutes in a voyage of 3,000 miles! The magnificent steamship named after the Orient Company has made the voyage from England to Australia in thirty-seven and a half days, or not very far from half the time occupied by other steamships a few years ago. This grand vessel is said to be only exceeded in size by the Great Eastern; she has a displacement of 9,500 tons and indicated horse-power of 5,400, and carries coal enough for her entire voyage—some 3,000 to 4,000 tons. But she is not to remain unchallenged, for, at the time these pages are being written, the Barrow Shipbuilding Company is constructing for the Inman line Atlantic service a still larger iron vessel, with engines of 8,500 horse-power, capable of propelling her at the rate of sixteen or seventeen knots; she will have four masts and three funnels. And yet another vessel of equal or greater power has been put on the stocks for the Cunard Company. Again, the largest steel steamship, or ship of any kind, has been launched at Dumbarton. She is intended largely for the cattle trade between the River Plate, Canada, and England. She is over 4,000 gross tonnage, and has been christened the Buenos Ayrean. The sums of money invested in the construction of these superb vessels are enormous. The Orient is said to have cost, without her fittings, little less than £150,000, her engines alone involving the expenditure of one-third of that amount. And yet a third-class or steerage ticket to the Antipodes by her costs only fifteen guineas, while the emigrant can go out to the United States or Canada by almost any one of the finest steamships of the various Atlantic services for six guineas.

Many routes might, of course, be taken round the world, England being the eventual goal in all cases. As quaint Sir John Mandeville says, in the first chapter of his “Travels”:—“In the Name of God Glorious and Allemyghty, he that wil passe over the See to go to the City of Jerusalem, he may go by many Weyes, bothe on See and Lande, aftre the Contree that hee cometh fro: manye of hem comen to an ende. But troweth not that I wil telle you alle the Townes and Cytees and Castelles that Men schaslle go by: for then scholde I make to longe a Tale; but alle only summe Contrees and most princypalle Stedes that Men schulle gone thorgh, to gon the righte Way.”

“Although,” says Mr. Simpson, the popular artist, in his work entitled “Meeting [pg 4]the Sun,” “the reference here is to Jerusalem only, yet in the Prologue he states that he was born in the ‘Town of Seynt Albanes,’ and ‘passed the See in the Yeer of Lord Jesu Christ MCCCXII, in the Day of Seynt Michelle, and hidne to have ben longe tyme over the See, and have reign and gon thorgh manye diverse Landes and many Provynces and Kingdomes and Iles, and have passed throghe Tartarye, Percye, Ermonye, the litylle and the gret; throghe Lybye, Caldee, and a gret partie of Ethiope, throghe Amazoyne, Inde the lasse and the more, a gret partie; and thorghe out many others Iles, that ben abouten Inde; where dwellen many dyverse Folkes, and of dyverse Maneres and Lawes, and of dyverse Schappes of Men.’ ” He adds further on in his “Boke” that going all round the world was not unknown even before his time.

“The world is wide,” yet the practical lines for a journey of this sort are very limited. There is the Siberian overland route, leading by St. Petersburg, Moscow, from which it goes about straight east through Siberia to Lake Baikal; and then there is about a month’s journey south, over the Mongolian Desert to Peking; or it may be varied by descending the great Amoor River, on which the Russians have a number of steamers, to Nicolaiefsk; thence sailing to San Francisco, and home by America and the Atlantic. “When,” says Mr. Simpson, “the Shah and Baron Reuter have made railways through Persia it may [pg 5]add slightly to the choice; perhaps when Russia civilises the whole of Central Asia it may open up a new route as far as China; but till that happy period, unless the traveller is willing, and at the same time able, to become a dervish, or something of that sort, like M. Vambéry, he had better not take the chance of risk in these regions. Many attempts have been made to pass from India to China, and vice versâ, but as yet no one has succeeded. The difficulties of such an enterprise are very great, not so much from the races of people as from the physical character of that region of the earth. These difficulties can, however, be overcome; and in evidence of this, we have perhaps one of the most wonderful expeditions of modern times in the journey of the two Jesuit missionaries, Huc and Gabet, from Peking to Lhassa. When they were ordered to leave the capital of the Great Lama, they wished to do so in the direction of Calcutta, as being by far the nearest, and, at the same time, the easiest way; but in vain. By a policy rigidly insisted upon by the Chinese Government, no one is allowed to pass anywhere along the frontiers between China and India.” This writer adds, that when travelling in Tibet he heard of many parties who wished to cross the frontier in that quarter, with the purpose only of having a few days’ shooting of some particular animal which they wanted to bring home; but he never knew of any one who was able to gratify his wish. One man told him that he had taken some pieces of very bright red cloth and other tempting bribes for the officials on the Chinese side, but it was all to no purpose. “It is not easy to understand why this intense jealousy should exist, but about the fact there can be no doubt.”

But dismissing any and all ideas of journeying by land through Europe, Asia, or Africa, our trip will be almost entirely by sea, the trans-continental route across America being excepted. Practically that route is to-day the best if you would reach quickly and pleasantly any part of the Pacific. The great railway is an enormous link binding the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans together. The Suez Canal and the Panama route have been mentioned in these pages—the first very fully; and place must certainly be had for a description of a railroad which is so intimately connected with the sea. But first we must reach it.

The passage across the “Great Atlantic Ferry” is now one of ease, and in the case of first-class passengers almost luxury. How different was it about forty years ago, even on the best steamships of that period! Charles Dickens has graphically described his experiences on board the Britannia, one of the earliest of the Cunard fleet, in one of his least-read works[4]—at least in the present generation. The little cupboard dignified by the name of “state-room;” the dingy saloon likened “to a gigantic hearse with windows in the sides;” the melancholy stove at which the forlorn stewards were rubbing their hands; the stewardess, whom Dickens blesses “for her piously fraudulent account of January voyages;” the excitement before leaving the dock; the captain’s boat and the dapper little captain; the last late mail bags, and the departure, are all sketched from nature, as the great novelist alone could depict them. And now they are off.

“‘The sea! the sea! the open sea!

That is the place where we all wish to be,

Rolling about so merrily!’

So all sing and say, by night and by day,

In the boudoir, the street, at the concert, and play,

In a sort of coxcombical roundelay.

You may roam through the City, transversely or straight,

From Whitechapel turnpike to Cumberland Gate,

And every young lady who thrums a guitar,

Every mustachioed shopman who smokes a cigar,

With affected devotion, promulgates his notion,

Of being a “Rover” and “Child of the Ocean”—

Whate’er their age, sex, or condition may be,

They all of them long for the “Wide, wide sea!”

But however they dote, only set them afloat,

In any craft bigger at all than a boat,

Take them down to the Nore, and you’ll see that before

The “wessel” they “woyage” in has made half her way

Between Shellness Point and the pier at Herne Bay,

Let the wind meet the tide in the slightest degree,

They’ll be all of them heartily sick of the sea!”

So says “Ingoldsby,” and it is, no doubt, true of some London Jack Tars and Cheapside buccaneers, who, on leaving port, are much more nautically “got up” than any of the crew. These stage sailors become very limp when the sea-water takes the starch out of them. Barham tells us of one Anthony Blogg:—

“So I’ll merely observe, as the water grew rougher

The more my poor hero continued to suffer,

Till the sailors themselves cried, in pity, ‘Poor buffer!’ ”

The great steamships of most lines running to distant foreign parts are comparatively easy and steady in their motions, and there is really more chance of being attacked by the mal de mer on an English or Irish Channel boat than there is on the voyage across the Atlantic. The waves in such channels are more cut up and “choppy” than are those of the broad ocean. The employment of the twin-boat, Calais-Douvres, has mitigated much of the horrors of one of our Channel lines. It is curious to note the fact that Indians often use a couple of canoes in very much the same manner as did the designer of the doubled-hulled vessel just mentioned. The writer has seen, in the Straits of Fuca, natives conveying all their possessions on the top of planks, placed over and lashed to two canoes. One suggestion for the improvement of the steamboat service across the Channel to France is to construct an enormous vessel, 650 feet long and 150 wide, a ship as long as the Great Eastern and twice her beam, to be propelled by both paddles and screws. She is to be capable of carrying several trains, and is to have a roofed station on board, with all the necessary saloons. Floating platforms are to connect this great steam ferry-boat with the shore rails, so that it can start or arrive at any time of the tide.

“Are you a good sailor?” asks one passenger of another just after leaving Liverpool. “Oh, I suppose I’m no worse than anybody else,” is, perhaps, the answer; while some are bold enough to answer, “Yes.” But Dickens noticed that the first day very few remained long over their wine, and that everybody developed an unusual love of the open air. Still, with the exception of one lady, “who had retired with some precipitation at [pg 7]dinner-time, immediately after being assisted to the finest cut of a very yellow boiled leg of mutton with very green capers,” there were few invalids the first night.

The subject of sea sickness is an unpleasant one, and cannot occupy much space here. Every old and many a new traveller has a remedy for it, so possibly the mention of our mode of prevention may be permitted here. It is simply for the sufferer to wear a very tight belt round the waist. It has been recommended to many fellow-passengers, and its use has proved invariably beneficial. The unusual motion, and sometimes the smells of the vessel, are the cause of the nausea felt. The tightened belt steadies the whole body, and, provided the sufferer be not bilious, soon braces him up corporally and mentally. If he is bilious (which he often is on account of leave-takings and festivities prior to his departure) the worst thing possible is generally recommended him—the ordinary brandy on board. Very fine old liqueur cognac in small doses can, however, be taken with advantage. An authority (Dr. Chapman) recommends the application of ice, enclosed in an india-rubber bag, to the spinal cord. In various travellers’ works, marmalade, cayenne pepper, port wine, chutnee, and West India pickles, are prescribed for the malady. The invalid would do much better by eating fresh or canned fruits of a cooling nature. But to return to the voyage. Dickens describes the first night at sea in feeling language.

“To one accustomed to such scenes,” says he, “this is a very striking time on shipboard. Afterwards, and when its novelty had long worn off, it never ceased to have a peculiar interest and charm for me. The gloom through which the great black mass holds its direct and certain course; the rushing water, plainly heard, but dimly seen; the broad white glistening track that follows in the vessel’s wake; the men on the look-out forward, who would be scarcely visible against the dark sky but for their blotting out some score of glistening stars; the helmsman at the wheel, with the illuminated card before him shining, a speck of light amidst the darkness, like something sentient and of Divine intelligence; the melancholy sighing of the wind through block and rope and chain; the gleaming forth of light from every crevice, nook, and tiny piece of glass about the decks, as though the ship were filled with fire in hiding, ready to burst through any outlet, wild with its resistless power of death and ruin.”

Irresistibly comic, as well as true, is his description of the ship during bad weather. “It is the third morning. I am awakened out of my sleep by a dismal shriek from my wife, who demands to know whether there’s any danger. I rouse myself and look out of bed. The water-jug is plunging and leaping like a lively dolphin; all the smaller articles are afloat, except my shoes, which are stranded on a carpet-bag, high and dry, like a couple of coal-barges. Suddenly I see them spring into the air, and behold the looking-glass, which is nailed to the wall, sticking fast upon the ceiling. At the same time the door entirely disappears, and a new one is opened in the floor. Then I begin to comprehend that the state-room is standing on its head.

“Before it is possible to make any arrangement at all compatible with this novel state of things the ship rights. Before one can say ‘Thank Heaven!’ she wrongs again. Before one can cry she is wrong, she seems to have started forward, and to be a creature actively running of its own accord, with broken knees and failing legs, through every variety of [pg 8]hole and pitfall, and stumbling constantly. * * * And so she goes on staggering, heaving, wrestling, leaping, diving, jumping, pitching, throbbing, rolling, and rocking, and going through all these movements sometimes by turns, and sometimes all together, until one feels disposed to roar for mercy.”

Dickens gives a droll account of a ridiculous situation in which he was placed. “About midnight we shipped a sea, which forced its way through the skylights, burst open the doors above, and came raging and roaring down into the ladies’ cabin, to the unspeakable consternation of my wife and a little Scotch lady—who, by the way, had previously sent a message to the captain by the stewardess, requesting him, with her compliments, to have a steel conductor immediately attached to the top of every mast and to the chimney, in order that the ship might not be struck by lightning. They and the handmaid before-mentioned, being in such ecstasies of fear that I scarcely knew what to do with them, I naturally bethought myself of some restorative or comfortable cordial; and nothing better occurring to me at the moment than hot brandy-and-water, I procured a tumblerful without delay. It being impossible to stand or sit without holding on, they were all heaped together in one corner of a long sofa—a fixture extending entirely across the cabin—where they clung to each other, in momentary expectation of being drowned. When I approached this place with my specific, and was about to administer it, with many consolatory expressions, to the nearest sufferer, what was my dismay to see them all roll slowly down to the other end! And when I staggered to that end, and held out the glass once more, how immensely baffled were my good intentions by the ship giving another lurch, and their all rolling back again! I suppose I dodged them up and down this sofa for at least a quarter of an hour, without reaching them once; and by the time I did catch them the brandy-and-water was diminished by constant spilling to a tea-spoonful.”

What a difference to the accommodations and comfort of most modern steamships, with their luxurious saloons placed amidships, where there is least motion; their spacious and airy state-rooms, warmed by steam, water laid on, and fitted with electric bells; their music-room with piano and harmonium, their smoking-room, bath-rooms, library, and even barber’s shop. The table is as well served as at the best hotel ashore, and the menu for the day is as extensive as that of a first-class restaurant, while everything that may be required in the drinkables, from modest bottled beer to rare old wine, is to be obtained from the steward. And provided that the passengers assimilate reasonably well, there will be enjoyable games, music, and possibly private theatricals and other regularly organised entertainments. The idea of a “Punch and Judy” in the middle of the Atlantic seems rather funny; but we have known of an instance in which even this form of amusement has been provided on board a great steamship! On long voyages it is not by any means uncommon for some one to start a MS. daily or weekly journal, to which many of the passengers contribute. Such have often been published afterwards for private circulation, as affording reminiscences of a pleasant voyage.

Then there is the pleasure of discovering “a sail in sight,” and of watching it grow larger by degrees as the vessels approach each other. The “look out” is kept by some passengers almost as persistently as by the sailors detailed for the purpose. Perhaps, again, the captain or officers have let out the fact that they should pass one of their own or some rival company’s [pg 10]vessel that day. How many eyes are strained after that first mere thread of smoke on the horizon! What ringing cheers as the two great steamships near each other! What an amount of anxious enthusiasm when it is known that a boat is coming off from the other vessel, and what feverish excitement to learn all the news! They may have been seven or eight days without any, and in that time what may not have occurred in the history of nations!

Then, again, the sea itself, in its varying beauty or grandeur, has for most travellers a great interest. Is there not a chance of seeing an iceberg, a whale, or even the great sea serpent?

In March-April, 1869, the writer crossed the Atlantic in splendid weather. The ocean was, for the ten days occupied on the passage, almost literally as calm as a lake; even the lady passengers emerged from their cabins two or three days before they would otherwise have ventured forth. Among them was one lady seventy-five years of age, who was running away—so she informed the passengers—from her husband, and going to join her children in the States. This female had “stood it” for fifty years, but now, she said, she was going to end her days in peace. Here was a champion of “woman’s rights!” Alas! on arrival in New York there was no one to receive her, and she was taken back on board the steamer. What became of her afterwards we know not.

THE STEERAGE OF AN ATLANTIC STEAMSHIP FORTY YEARS AGO.

The woes of steerage passengers have been graphically described by Charles Dickens. He tells us that “unquestionably any man who retained his cheerfulness among the steerage accommodations of that noble and fast-sailing packet, the Screw, was solely indebted to his own resources, and shipped his good humour like his provisions, without any contribution or assistance from the owners. A dark, low, stifling cabin, surrounded by berths filled to overflowing with men, women, and children, in various stages of sickness and misery, is not the liveliest place of assembly at any time; but when it is so crowded, as the steerage cabin of the Screw was every passage out, that mattrasses and beds are heaped on the floor, to the extinction of everything like comfort, cleanliness, and decency, it is liable to operate not only as a pretty strong barrier against amiability of temper, but as a positive encourager of selfish and rough humours.” Dickens follows with a dismally correct picture of the passengers, with their shabby clothes, paltry stores of poor food and other supplies, and their wealth of family. He adds that every kind of suffering bred of poverty, illness, banishment, and tedious voyaging in bad weather was crammed into that confined space, and the picture, almost revolting in its naked truthfulness, was not overdrawn in those days. It could not be written, however, of any steerage whatever in our times, for partly from governmental care, partly from the general improvement in means of travel, partly from competition and the praiseworthy desire of the owners to earn a high character for their vessels’ accommodations, the steerage of to-day is comparatively decent; although it is not yet that which it should be, nor has the progress of improvement kept anything like pace with railway accommodation of the cheaper kind. Yet one would think it to the interest of owners[5] to make the steerage an endurable place of temporary abode.

In 1879 nearly 118,000 steerage passengers left the port of Liverpool for the United States. It should be noted that this was from one port, undeniably the principal one for emigration, but still by no means the only British one used for that purpose. Observe further that it was for America alone that these emigrants were bound. According to the United States census of 1870, there were at that time 5,600,000 human beings in the country who were foreign born, and this number has since gone on increasing to a very large extent. Nine-tenths of them at the least crossed the Great Ferry in ships bearing the Union Jack, and of these, three-fourths or more crossed as steerage passengers. Hence the importance of the question.

Latterly a considerable amount of attention has been given to the sub-division of the steerage space, so that, when practicable, friends and families may remain together. Married people and single women have now separate quarters. The sleeping accommodations are the weak point. They are simply rough wooden berths, and the passenger has to furnish his own bedding, as well as plate, mug, knife, fork, spoon, and water-can. The provisions are now-a-days generally ample, and on some lines are provided ad libitum. The bill of fare is pretty usually as follows. Breakfast: coffee, fresh bread or biscuit, and butter, or oatmeal porridge and molasses; Dinner: soup, beef or pork, and potatoes—fish may be substituted for the meat; on Sunday pudding is often added; Tea: tea, biscuit and butter. Three quarts of fresh water are allowed daily. A passenger who has a few shillings to spend can often obtain a few extras from the steward, and many, of course, take a small stock of the minor luxuries of life on board with him.

To those of small means who are contemplating emigration, the “Intermediate” (second-class) on board some of the Atlantic steamers to the States and Canada can be commended. For a couple of guineas over the steerage rates, excellent state-rooms, generally with four to six berths in each, furnished with bedding and lavatory arrangements, are provided. The intermediate passenger has a separate general saloon, and the table is well provided with good plain living. As the steerage passenger has to provide so many things for himself, it is almost as cheap to travel second-class.

AT DINNER IN THE FIRST-CLASS DINING SALOON OF AN ATLANTIC STEAMSHIP DURING A STORM.

Almost every reader will remember Martin Chuzzlewit and Mark Tapley on board the wretched Screw. How, for example, “the latter awoke with a dim idea that he was dreaming of having gone to sleep in a four-post bedstead which had turned bottom upwards in the course of the night,” for which there seemed some reason, as “the first objects he recognised when he opened his eyes were his own heels looking down at him, as he afterwards observed, from a nearly perpendicular elevation.” “This is the first time as ever I stood on my head all night,” observed Mark.

The lesson taught by Dickens regarding the necessity of keeping up one’s spirits on board ship, and better, of helping to keep up those of others, as exemplified by poor Tapley, is a very important one. If anything will test character, life on board a crowded ship will do it. Who that has read can ever forget Mark, when he calls to the poor woman to “hand over one of them young ’uns, according to custom.” “ ‘I wish you’d get breakfast, Mark, instead of worrying with people who don’t belong to you,’ observed Martin, petulantly.” “ ‘All right,’ said Mark; ‘she’ll do that. It’s a fair division of labour, sir. I wash her [pg 12]boys and she makes our tea. I never could make tea, but any one can wash a boy.’ The woman, who was delicate and ill, felt and understood his kindness—as well she might, for she had been covered every night with his great coat, while he had for his own bed the bare boards and a rug.” “If a gleam of sun shone out of the dark sky,” continues Dickens, “down Mark tumbled into the cabin, and presently up he came again with a woman in his arms, or half-a-dozen children, or a man, or a bed, or a saucepan, or a basket, or something animate or inanimate that he thought would be the better for the air. If an hour or two of fine weather in the middle of the day tempted those who seldom or never came on deck at other times to crawl into the long-boat, or lie down upon the spare spars and try to eat, there in the centre of the group was Mr. Tapley, handing about salt beef and biscuit, or dispensing tastes of grog, or cutting up the children’s provisions with his pocket-knife for their greater ease and comfort, or reading aloud from a venerable newspaper, or singing some roaring old song to a select party, or writing the beginnings of letters to their friends at home for people who couldn’t write, or cracking jokes with the crew, or nearly getting blown over the side, or emerging half-drowned from a shower of spray, or lending a hand somewhere or other: but always doing something for the general entertainment.”

NEW YORK BAY, LOOKING ACROSS TO STATEN ISLAND.

Dickens drew his picture from life, and although an extreme case, there are many Mark Tapleys yet to be met. And indeed, unless the emigrant can remain happy and jovial amid the unmistakable hardships of even the best regulated steerage, he had better have stopped at home. If he can stand them well, he is of the stuff that will make a good colonist or settler, ready to “rough it” at any time. Before leaving the subject of steerage passengers and emigrants, it may be well to note that the United States Government does all in its power on their arrival in New York to protect them from imposition and furnish them with trustworthy information. At the depôt at Castle Gardens, where third-class passengers land, there are interpreters, money-changers, railway-ticket offices, and rooms for their accommodation; and it is very much their own fault if they slide into the pitfalls of New York—for New York has pitfalls, like every other great city.

The risks of the voyage across the Atlantic are not really as great as those of ships passing southwards through the Bay of Biscay, which is the terror of passengers to Australia, India, China, and other points in the Orient. At the beginning of 1880 the fine S.S. Chimborazo returned with difficulty to Plymouth, three persons having been washed overboard, and one killed from injuries received on board. Off Ushant a formidable gale arose, and the vessel began to roll heavily, while on the following morning the storm had become a hurricane, and the water was taken on board and below in volumes, threatening a fate similar to that experienced by the London. Just before 9 A.M. an enormous sea broke over the ship, heeling her over and washing the deck with resistless force. The steam launch, six heavy boats, the smoking room, saloon companion, and everything on the spar deck, were in three seconds carried overboard among the breakers as though they were mere children’s toys, while, in addition to the losses of life already mentioned, seventeen other passengers were more or less injured. Just before the ship was struck the smoking-room was full of passengers, who were requested by the captain to leave it to give place to some helpless sheep who were floundering about, and to this fact they owed their lives. “As,” said a leading journal, “the stricken ship entered Plymouth Harbour on Tuesday morning, her shattered stanchions and skylights, her damaged steering apparatus, and the heap of wreckage lying upon her deck, proclaimed the fury of the tremendous ordeal through which she had passed, and awakened many a heartfelt and silent prayer of gratitude among her rescued passengers, as they contemplated the evidences of the peril from which they had so narrowly escaped.” It is in moments such as these that the poverty of human words is keenly felt. There can be no doubt that, but for the excellent seamanship displayed by Captain Trench and his officers there would have been a sadder story to relate.

[pg 14]

CHAPTER II.

Ocean to Ocean.—The Connecting Link.

The Great Trans-Continental Railway—New York to Chicago—Niagara in Winter—A Lady’s Impressions—A Pullman Dining Car—Omaha—“The Great Muddy”—Episodes of Railway Travel—Rough Roads—Indian Attempts at Catching Trains—Ride on a Snow Plough—Sherman—Female Vanity in the Rocky Mountains—Soaped Rails—The Great Plains—Summer and Winter—The Prairie on Fire—A Remarkable Bridge—Coal Discoveries—The “Buttes”—The Gates of Mormondom—Echo and Weber Cañons—The Devil’s Gate—Salt Lake—Ride in a “Mud Waggon”—The City of the Saints—Mormon Industry—A Tragedy of Former Days—Mountain Meadow Massacre—The “Great Egg-shell”—Theatre—The Silver State—“Dead Heads”—Up in the Sierra Nevada—Alpine Scenery—The Highest Newspaper Office in the World—“Snowed up”—Cape Horn—Down to the Fruitful Plains—Sunny California—Sacramento—Oakland and the Golden City—Recent Opinions of Travellers—San Francisco as a Port—Whither Away?

Sufficient mention of New York has already been made in this work. The tourist or traveller bound round the world, viâ the great trans-continental railway and San Francisco, has at starting from the commercial metropolis of America, and as far as Omaha, a choice of routes, all the fares being identical for a “through ticket” to the Pacific. You may go among the Pennsylvanian mountains and valleys, and catch many a glimpse of the coal and coal “ile” fields; the country generally being thickly wooded. The Pennsylvania, Pittsburg, and Fort Wayne Railway passes through really grand scenery, and the construction of the road has been a work of great difficulty, involving extensive cuttings and embankments and long tunnels. The road takes a serpentine course among the mountains, and at one point, known as the “Horse-shoe Bend,” the line curves round so much that it almost meets itself again. A train following your own appears to be going in the opposite direction. The only city of any importance on this route, before Chicago is reached, is Pittsburg, the busy, coaly, sooty, and grimy—a place reminding one of Staffordshire, and abounding in iron and cutlery works. It is situated among really charming scenery, near where the Monongahela, Alleghany, and Ohio rivers meet, and is an ugly blot among the verdant and peaceful surroundings. After leaving Pittsburg the railroad passes through a charmingly fresh and fruitful country, watered by the Ohio. “Long stretches of green meadows, shut in by hill and dale, shady nooks, cosy farm-houses, and handsome villas, steamers, barges, boats, and timber-rafts—almost as large as those famous Rhine rafts—on the river, make up a varied and most attractive scene.” Next you reach Indiana, a country of fairly good soil, bad swamps, fearful fever and ague, and an indolent and shiftless people. In general terms it is a good country to leave.

But the tourist’s popular route from New York to Chicago is that briefly known as “The Great Central.” At Niagara it passes over a bridge spanning the river below the great Falls, where a tolerable view is obtainable. Most tourists naturally stop a day or two at the Falls, where there are fine hotels. They have been so often described that every schoolboy knows all about them. They are especially worth seeing under their winter aspect, when miniature icebergs and floes are falling, crashing, and grinding with the water. Below the Falls these will bank up to a considerable height, and the river is in places completely frozen over. From the rocks huge stalactites of hundreds of tons of ice depend. The contrast of the dashing green waters with the crystal ice and virgin snow around is very beautiful. [pg 15]Some idea of the volume of water may be gathered from this fact: the Niagara River a mile and a half above the Falls is two and a half miles wide, and is there very deep. At the Falls all this water is narrowed to about 800 yards in breadth. A traveller already mentioned[6] thus describes her impressions:—

“Nor do I think that the most powerful imagination can, with its greatest effort, attain even an approximate notion of the awful sublimity of this natural wonder. Like all other stupendous things which the mind has been unaccustomed to measure and to contemplate, Niagara requires time to grow upon one. The mind also demands time to struggle up to its dimensions, and time to gather up its harmonies into the mighty tones which finally fill the soul with their overwhelming cadences, and whose theme, ever-varying but still the same—as in the hands of a Handel or a Beethoven—thunders through the whole extent of one’s being—‘Almighty Power!’

“The chief impression produced upon the mind by Niagara is the perpetuity of immeasurable force and grandeur. This it is which lends such a strange fascination to the Falls; however pressingly one is desirous of getting away, one is obliged to turn back again, and yet again, like the disturbed needle to the magnetic pole. There is nothing in the way of natural scenery which has stamped itself so clearly, indelibly, and awfully on my mind as this gigantic magnificence; as this mighty body of waters, gliding stealthily but rapidly on its onward course above the Falls, springing forward more wildly, more exultingly, as it nears the brink, until it leaps over into the abyss to swell the mighty canticle, which, for thousands and thousands of years, by day and by night, through every season, has ascended in tones of subdued thunder to the Creator’s throne.”

Passing over all intermediate points, the traveller at length reaches the Garden City, Chicago. This, which used to be counted a western city—it is 900 miles west of New York—is now considered almost an eastern one. And it must be remembered that this place of half a million souls is a port. Large sailing-vessels and steamers enter and leave it daily, and through Lake Michigan and the chain of other lakes can reach the ocean direct. There are miles on miles of wharfs, and it is generally considered one of the “livest” business places in America. Handsomely laid-out and built, the city now hardly bears a trace of the terrific conflagration which in 1871 laid three-fourths of the finest streets in ruins.

From Chicago to Omaha the various routes have little to interest the ordinary traveller, and so, while speeding on together, let us dine in a Pullman hotel car. On entering you will be presented with a bewildering bill of fare, commencing with soups and finishing with ice-cream and black coffee. The dinner is served on little separate tables, while the purity of the cloths and table napkins, the brightness of the plate, and the crystal clearness of the glass-ware, leave nothing to desire. You can have a glass of iced water, for they have an ice-cellar; you can obtain anything, from a bottle of beer to one of Burgundy, port, or champagne; and cigars are also kept “en board;” while at the particular point indicated you will not pay more than seventy-five cents (about three shillings) for the dinner. It must be admitted that the liquid refreshments are generally very dear: a “quarter” [pg 16](i.e., twenty-five cents, the fourth of a dollar) for any small drink, fifty cents for a very small bottle of Bass, and wines expensive in proportion. Still you dine at your ease and leisure, instead of rushing out with a crowd at the “eating stations,” where the trains usually stop three times a day. We have the authority of Mr. W. F. Rae for stating that “no royal personage can be more comfortably housed than the occupant of a Pullman car, provided the car be an hotel one.”[7]

A PULLMAN RAILWAY CAR.

At Omaha, on the Missouri, the Pacific Railway proper commences, although the various New York and other lines, as we have seen, connect with it. The river, irreverently known on the spot as “The Great Muddy,” from the colour of its water and its numerous sand and mud banks, is crossed at this point by a fine bridge. Apropos of the said banks, which are constantly shifting, a story is told of a countryman who, years ago, before the age of steam ferries, wanted to cross the Missouri near this point. He did not see his way till he observed a sand-bank “washing-up,” as they call it, to the surface of the water near the shore on which he stood. He jumped on it, and it shifted so rapidly that it took him clear across the river, and he was able to land on the opposite side! The story is an exaggerated version of fact. The shifting sand-banks make navigation perilous, and good river pilots command a high figure.

The literature of the railway has hardly yet been attempted. It is true that scarcely a day passes without something of interest transpiring in connection therewith: now some grand improvement, now a terrible accident or narrow escape, and now again the opening of some important line. The humours of railroad travel—good and bad—often enliven the [pg 17]pages of our comic journals, while the strictly mechanical aspect of the subject is fully treated in technical papers. But the facts remain that all this is of a transient nature, and that the railway can hardly be said yet to have a literature of its own.

MADISON STREET, CHICAGO.

The following episodes mainly refer to the grand railway under notice, which is by all odds the longest direct road on the surface of the globe. From New York to San Francisco the distance by this railway is 3,300 miles, and the ticket for the through journey is about two feet long! This would be more justly described as a series of tickets or coupons. The writer has crossed the American continent twice by this route, his first trip having been made on its completion in 1869, when, as correspondent of a daily journal, he had ample facilities for examining it in detail. In Chicago he had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Pullman, who kindly furnished him with information which in those days, at all events, was new to the British public. He was even then trying to get his famous carriages introduced into England; as events proved, it took him several years to get them even tested. In this connection he is credited with a bon mot. He was speaking of our land in the highest terms, but, like many Americans, did not think we adopted new ideas with sufficient readiness. “It is a grand country,” said he, “a grand country. But you have to be born very young there;” meaning that otherwise you might grow grey in the consummation of even a promising scheme.

When the writer first crossed the continent the railway was very much in the rough. Rails laid at the rate of seven, and, on one occasion, ten miles a day, can hardly be implicitly relied upon; much of the road was flimsily ballasted, and many of the bridges were temporary wooden structures of a shaky order. The train had sometimes to literally crawl along; passengers would often get off and walk some distance ahead, easily beating the locomotives, and be found seated on the boulders at the side of the road, having had time for a quarter of an hour’s smoke. Mr. James Mortimer Murphy, in his “Rambles in Northwestern America,” gives some similar experiences on a still rougher line on which he travelled from Wallula, on the Columbia River, to a point in Washington Territory. The railroad was only fifteen miles long, and had wooden rails. Having secured an interview with the president, secretary, conductor, and brakesman of the road—represented by one and the same individual—he was booked as a passenger, and placed on some rough iron in an open truck, with instructions to cling to the sides, and be most careful not to stand on the floor if he cared anything about his limbs. The miserable little engine gave a grunt or two, several wheezy puffs, a cat-like scream, and finally got the train under weigh, proceeding at the headlong speed of two miles an hour, “rocking,” says the narrator, “like a canoe in a cross sea. The gentleman who represented all the train officials did not get on the train, but told the engineer to go on, and he would overtake him in the course of an hour. Before I had proceeded half a mile I saw why I was not permitted to stand on the floor of the truck, for a piece of hoop-iron, which covered the wooden rails in some places, curled up into what is called a ‘snake head,’ and pushed through the wood with such force that it nearly stopped the train. After this was withdrawn the engine resumed its course, and at the end of seven hours hauled one weary passenger, with eyes made sore from the smoke, and coat and hat nearly burnt off by the sparks, into a station composed of a rude board shanty, through whose apertures the wind howled, having made the entire distance of fifteen miles in that time.” The drivers of the passing “prairie schooners,” as the waggons drawn by eight or more pairs of mules or oxen are called, occasionally challenged the president of the line to run a race with them in his old machine; but he scorned their offers, and kept quietly walking beside his train. This eccentric railway has since been superseded by one much more desirable, while in justice to the great line referred to, it must be said that it is now, and long has been, in admirable condition, and that it is crossed by numerous express, emigrant, and freight trains daily.

The Indians have never given the trans-continental railway companies much trouble since the completion of the lines. Early in its history a story is told, however, of the Chien or Dog Indians, from whom the town of Cheyenne takes its name. They had a strong prejudice against the iron horse with the fiery eyes, and determined to vanquish him. Some thirty of them mounted their ponies, and urging them up the line, valiantly charged a coming train. It is perhaps unnecessary to state that fragments of defunct red men were found shortly afterwards strewed about the road, and that the tribe has not since repeated the experiment. Perhaps better is the true story of the Piute Indians of Nevada, who tried to catch a train, and found that they had “caught a Tartar” instead. Annoyed by the snorting monster, they laid in ambush, and as it approached dexterously threw a lasso, such as is used for catching cattle, over the “smoke stack,” [pg 19]or funnel of the locomotive, while a number of them held on to the other end of the rope. The engine went on its way unharmed; but it is said that the eccentric gymnastics performed by the Indians, as they were pulled at twenty-five miles an hour over the rocks and boulders at the side of the track, were more amusing to the passengers than to themselves.

Most readers will have heard of the celebrated “Cape Horn,” high up among the Sierra Nevada mountains, where the Central Pacific Railway rounds the edge of a fearful cliff. The traveller is there between six and seven thousand feet above the sea level; and at the particular point of which mention is now made there is a precipice descending almost perpendicularly to a depth of fifteen hundred feet. Above, again, rise the walls of the same rocky projection to a still greater height. The sublimity of the spot is undoubted, but as regards the passengers, the ridiculous too often appears upon the scene. Most ladies and many timid men audibly shudder at this juncture, and after taking a hasty glance downwards at the turbulent Truckee River dashing round the base of the precipice, retire to the other side of the carriage, where there is nothing but the prospect of a rough-hewn rocky wall a foot or so off the carriages. Is it with the idea of ballasting the train? Perhaps like the ostrich, they think themselves out of danger, when danger is hidden!

Not very far from the above spot, on the western side of the mountains, where the grades are particularly steep, an accident occurred a few years ago which had more of the comic element than the serious. A train, proceeding at a rapid rate, broke in two, the locomotive and several carriages dashing on, while the second half of the train followed at slower speed. At length the foremost car of this part of the train left the rails, and breaking off from the couplings, turned bottom upwards on the embankment, just coming to an anchor at the edge of a ravine, into which, had it fallen, no one could have been saved. A husband of Falstaffian proportions was in one of the foremost carriages which had proceeded with the locomotive, and as soon as they stopped he scrambled off, running back to the scene of the accident, hurrying and stumbling and shinning himself on and over the rough roadway and obtrusive sleepers, for his wife was in one of the hindmost cars, and he feared the worst. At last he approached the wreck, where his wife was seen standing, calmly waving a handkerchief, she having climbed out through one of the windows, almost unhurt. She had just been tending the one damaged person of the whole number. That individual, in his anxiety to grasp something as the carriage overturned, had seized on the hot stove, and was badly, though not seriously, burned.

Not altogether a nuisance is an institution inseparably connected with American trains—the peripatetic boy who offers you one minute a newspaper, the next a novel, and then anything from a cigar or a box of sweetmeats to a “prize package.” These latter are of all values, from a twenty-five cent package of stationery to a bound book at a dollar and a half, about one in a hundred of which may possibly contain a money prize. The writer had been a good customer as regards paper-covered novels, and his plan was to sell the books back at half-price, then purchasing a new story, and this, of course, suited the boys well enough. In consequence of these and other purchases, he was one day allowed to win a five-dollar “greenback” in a prize package. He was somewhat annoyed afterwards to find that he had been used really as the “decoy duck.” The news of his winnings flew through the carriage, and even through the train, and the enterprising youngster soon [pg 20]sold a dozen or so of the same packages, and, it may be added, the same number of purchasers. There were no more prizes that day!

ON THE PACIFIC RAILWAY: A SCENE IN THE SIERRA NEVADA MOUNTAINS.

A newspaper is published regularly on the overland trains of the Pacific Railway. There are telegraph stations everywhere on the route, and the latest news is handed “aboard” to the editor, leader-writer, compositor, and pressman—represented by, or condensed into, one and the same individual—as soon as the train arrives, and is immediately “set up” and printed. Thus “specials,” “extra specials,” and “special extra specials” follow one another in rapid succession, and keep the train alive with excitement.

A term which has come into vogue here originated on the Pacific Railway during the writer’s stay in California. A terrible accident occurred near Oakland, in which one [pg 21]train of the long cars usual in the United States met and literally “telescoped” another. The expression was used in a rather curious way in San Francisco for some time afterwards. If a business man in a hurry ran into another person—say, for example, coming round a corner—the latter would ejaculate, “Hi! are you trying to telescope a fellow?”

The writer will not soon forget his ride from Laramie to Sherman, a station on one of the ridges of the Rocky Mountains, which the Pacific Railway crosses at an altitude of over 8,000 feet. Armed with a pass from the company, the courteous station-master at the former place made no objection to his accompanying a locomotive with a snow-plough attached in front, then starting ahead of the regular train. The plough was a rough specimen of its kind, in form not greatly unlike the ram of an ironclad, and was constructed of sheet-iron, covering a strong wooden frame. But it did its work efficiently, scattering the soft snow on either side in waves and spray, reminding one of the passage of some great ocean steamship through the billows. The snow had drifted in places till it was five or six feet deep on the road, but this proved child’s play to the plough, and the services of the navvies, who, seated on the coal, were swinging their legs over the side of the tender, were not required. The greatest danger on the line, now so amply protected by great snow sheds—literally wooden tunnels—and snow fences, arises from snow which has thawed, frozen, re-thawed, and re-frozen until it is literally packed ice. The wheels of a locomotive, arrived at such a point, either revolve helplessly, without progressing, or run clean off the metals.

The mention of the effect of ice on the rails recalls a story told by Colonel Bulkley, when the latter was chief of the Russo-American Telegraph Expedition. The colonel during the civil war in the States was at the head of a constructing party, who built temporary lines of telegraph to follow the advancing northern army. The driver of a train which passed through the district in which they were engaged had been ordered to stop nightly and pick the party up, but one night neglected to do so, and the weary constructors had to tramp a dozen miles in the dark to the nearest village. The men naturally determined that this should not occur again, and so next morning armed themselves with several boxes of bar soap. What for? To soap the rails! Colonel Bulkley tells gleefully how they rubbed it on for about a quarter of a mile, how the train arrived at the place, and after gliding on a certain distance, from the momentum it had acquired, came nearly to a standstill, and how the men jumped on and told the joke to everybody. The engineer next day did not forget to remember them.

“Some writers strongly advise the traveller to make a halt at Sherman station,” says Mr. Rae. “The inducements held out to him are mountain scenery, invigorating air, fishing and hunting. A sojourn among the peaks of the Rocky Mountains has the attraction of novelty to recommend it. Life there must be, in every sense of the word, a new sensation. But some sensations are undesirable, notwithstanding their undoubted freshness. That splendid trout swarm in the streams near Sherman admits of no dispute. Yet the disciple of Isaak Walton should not be tempted to indulge rashly in his harmless and charming sport. It is delightful to hook large fish; but it is less agreeable to be pierced through by arrows. Now, the latter contingency is among the probabilities which must be taken into consideration. A few weeks prior to my journey, one of the conductors of the train by which I travelled, learned, by practical experience, that fishing among the [pg 22]Rocky Mountains has palpable and painful drawbacks. Having taken a few days’ holiday, he went forth, fishing-rod in hand, to amuse himself. While whipping the stream in the innocence of his heart, he was startled to find himself made the target for arrows shot by wild Indians. He sought safety in flight, and recovered from his wounds, to the surprise as much as to the gratification of his friends. His story did not render me desirous of sharing his fate.”

The Great Plains, over which the “prairie schooners”[8] toil, and the trains now fly, have a dreary interest of their own. In summer they are hot and dusty, and the contemplation of nearly unlimited sage-brush, and the occasional prairie dog or hen, is not enlivening; while the constant recurrence of skeletons bleaching in the sun—skeletons of overworked mules, horses, and oxen, and sometimes of the human animal—is apt to make one melancholy. But on a winter moonlight evening, when covered with snow, which has thawed in the day, and become glacé at night, they resemble one vast glittering lake, with the brush-covered hillocks standing for islands. The buffaloes, once so common, are rarely or never seen near the railway. In that more fertile portion of the plains nearer the Missouri, in Nebraska and adjoining states, it is also possible that the oft-times grand sight of the prairie on fire may be witnessed from the train. The writer was, one evening in May, 1868, in company with others, in a Pullman car, when huge massive clouds of smoke hanging over the horizon appeared in view. Soon it became evident, as the train approached the spot, that the prairie was on fire for miles, although fortunately at some distance from the line. The flames rose fiercely to the peaceful, starlit sky; the homesteads of settlers, trees, and hillocks stood out black against the line of destroying fire; while over all a canopy of smoke hung heavily, affording a scene not soon to be forgotten.

Westward from the high point where Sherman stands, the railway line makes a rapid descent to the Laramie Plains, the trains going down, not merely by their own weight, but with brakes tightly screwed down. At Dale Creek, on this section of the line, a wonderful bridge is crossed. It is 650 feet long, and in the centre of the deep ravine it bridges is 126 feet high. It is built entirely of wood, was erected in thirty days, and is a perfect puzzle of trestle-work. “More than one passenger,” says Mr. Rae, “who would rather lose a fine sight than risk a broken neck, breathes more freely, and gives audible expression to his satisfaction, when once the cars have passed in safety over this remarkable wooden structure.” Now the train is again proceeding rapidly; in twenty miles, the descent of 1,000 feet is accomplished. Next, Laramie City is reached, round which is a good grazing country. This is succeeded by the plains known as “The Great American Desert,” another barren sage-brush-covered stretch of country. And yet—in addition to the fact that even sage-brush is good for something, a decoction of it being recommended in cases of ague—the desert has been proved to contain its treasures. At Carbon, and other stations on the line, fine deposits of coal have been found, and are worked to advantage. It was at first feared that all the coal for the railway would have to be transported from far distant points.

Among the wonders of the plains are the huge rocks and bluffs known as the “Buttes,” which often rise from comparatively level ground, and in detached spots. Seen in the gloaming, their often grotesque forms appear weird and unearthly, and the effect is increased by the fact that all around is silent and desolate, and their mocking echoes to the snorting iron horse are the only sounds that are heard. Some of these rock-masses are columnar, and others pyramidal, in form; some assume the shape of heads, human or otherwise. Now they rise in huge walls, with as wonderful colouring as have the cliffs at Alum Bay in the Isle of Wight; they are often several hundred feet in height. One, particularly noted by the writer, had almost the exact form of an enormous dog seated on its haunches.

As the train approaches the confines of Mormondom some specially grand scenery is met and passed. The stern and rugged ravine known as Echo Cañon[9] is shut in by abrupt and almost perpendicular sandstone and conglomerate cliffs, with many a crag standing sentinel-like, and rising high towards heaven, over the impetuous, brawling Weber river. Close to the Mormon town of Echo there is a cliff 1,000 feet high, which overhangs its base fifty feet. There is also a rock known as “The Sphinx of the Valley,” from a resemblance to the original. Weber Cañon succeeds the first-named, and in this is to be noted a remarkable and nearly perpendicular cleft in the cliff—well known as “The Devil’s Slide.” Further on, and the train arrives at “The Devil’s Gate,” where the stern rock-walls narrow, and the dark hills approach each other closely. Here the river becomes a boiling and furious rapid, white with foam, hurrying onward with terrible impetuosity, and rolling tons of boulders before its resistless course. Some of the early railway bridges were quite washed away by it, and many difficulties were met in the construction of the line, heavy tunneling almost obviously having been necessary in some places. But all obstacles were successfully overcome. Emerging from the gloomy, rugged cañon, the more or less fertile and cultivated Weber valley is, by contrast, a perfect glimpse of Paradise.

Few travellers, however much they may have to hurry, will pass through Utah without a flying visit to Salt Lake City, now a very different place from what it was when Captain Burton wrote his “City of the Saints.” The Mormon capital is not on the main line of the Pacific Railway, but is connected with it by a short branch of forty miles in length. Ogden is the “junction” for Salt Lake, and has a very tolerable station, with dining-rooms, book-stands, and other conveniences. The last time the writer passed through this part of Utah in winter, the (spirit) thermometer on the platform at Ogden marked −16° Fahr., or 48° below the freezing-point of water. On the first visit, the branch railway was barely commenced, and he proceeded to the “city” in a “mud-waggon,” a kind of packing-case on wheels—for he can hardly say on springs—which was driven at a furious rate. How many miles he travelled perpendicularly—in jolts—he knows not, but he was very tired on arrival at his destination. Yet the journey had much of interest in it. There was, for instance, almost all the way in sight, and sometimes within a few hundred yards, the Great Salt Lake—the Dead Sea of America—whose waters are said to be [pg 24]one-third salt. This is probably an exaggeration, but its shores are white with a mineral efflorescence, and it took the Mormons years to irrigate much of the surrounding land, and thus literally wash the salty deposits out of it. The fresh water for the purpose had to be diverted and brought in hill-side ditches, &c., in many cases from a considerable distance. The result has repaid them, for the road from Ogden to Utah passes through several prosperous towns, and by scores of pleasant homesteads embowered in gardens and orchards of peach and apple trees, the marks of industrious farm cultivation being everywhere apparent.

CAMP DOUGLAS GARRISON, NEAR SALT LAKE CITY.

At one period there was some opposition among the Mormons to the construction of the trans-continental railway through their territory, as they feared that influx of strangers which has actually come to pass. The late Brigham Young, however, was either more enlightened, or saw that it was no use fighting against the inevitable, and actually took contracts to assist in making the railroad, besides afterwards building the branch line to the city. It was cleverly said by the New York Herald that “railway communications corrupt good Mormons,” to which President Young is stated to have replied that “he did not care anything for a religion which could not stand a railroad.” And in fact, up to a comparatively recent date, several thousand fresh recruits, principally from Great Britain and the northern nations of Europe, have been conveyed over it annually.

This is not the place for any discussion of the Mormon mystery. It is easy to laugh at it, and say with Artemus Ward that, “While Brigham’s religion was singular, his wives were plural.” The fact remains that, in hundreds of cases, Mormons had and have but one wife; although, theoretically, they approve of polygamy. The further point [pg 25]remains that no Mormon was allowed to have more than one helpmeet unless he could prove that his means were amply sufficient for her support. Industry was the keystone of Brigham Young’s teachings, however otherwise mixed with fanaticism and superstition, and the result has been that thousands of people, mostly poor, who settled in an unpromising-looking country, have now homes and farms of their own, and that by sheer hard work the desert has been made literally “to blossom as the rose.”

A STREET IN SALT LAKE CITY.

Salt Lake City has been laid out with care, and the streets are wide and well kept; while, excepting those of a small business centre, every house has a very large garden attached. The days of the “avenging angels,” or Danites, is over, and every man’s life and property are nowadays safe there, although at one time many suspected or obnoxious persons were, as our American cousins say, “found missing.” On one terrible occasion—the Mountain Meadow massacre—a whole train of emigrants who, on their way to California, had encamped near the city, were murdered by Indians, whom, there is no doubt, the Mormons had incited to the deed. A dignitary of the Mormon Church, Bishop Lee, suffered the death-penalty at the hands of the United States authorities for his share in the transaction. The emigrants, then passing with their families by the hundred, had, there is no doubt, much aggravated the Mormons by jeering and mockery, and sometimes by purloining their cattle and goods. There has been for many years a garrison of United States troops kept at Camp Douglas, a short distance from Salt Lake City, for the protection of Gentiles,[10] and the regulation of affairs generally.

One of the best features of this strange community is the marked absence of drunkenness and profligacy. Most Mormons are teetotallers, and drink little more than tea or coffee, or the crystal water which runs in deep brooks through every street, and has its birth in the heights of the beautiful snow-clad Wahsatch Mountains, which are a great feature in the scenery of Salt Lake Valley. Salt Lake City has a remarkable building, known by the faithful as “The Tabernacle,” and by the irreverent as the “Big Egg-shell,” from the oval form of its roof. It holds 8,000 persons, or, under pressure, even more. It has an organ in point of size the second in America. The writer attended a service there, given in honour of some missionary Mormons who were about to part for Europe. The Salt Lake theatre is another feature of the place, and has a good company of Mormon amateur actors and actresses. We once saw there some twenty-five of Brigham Young’s family in the front rows of the pit. Formerly, it is said, payment at the doors was taken “in kind,” and a Mormon would deposit at the box-office a ham, a plump sucking-pig—not alive—a bag of dried peaches, or a dozen mop-handles, maybe, for his seats!

Taking a last glimpse of the great Salt Lake, passing Corinne, where, when it was only six weeks old, a bank and a newspaper office, both in tents, had been established, the train proceeds through a more or less barren district on its way to Nevada, the Silver State, a country where, for the most part, life is only endurable when one is making money rapidly. Those who would see some of the silver mines with comparative ease “get off” the train at Reno, thence proceeding by branch rail to Virginia City and Gold Hill, places where that form of mining life may be studied to perfection. So great has been the yield of the Nevada and other silver mines of adjoining territories, that, as most of us know, the value of silver has actually depreciated. Some of the millionaires of San Francisco gained their wealth in Nevada.

In the United States the distances between leading places is so great that the fares charged, albeit generally moderate, cannot suit slender purses, while empty pockets are nowhere. In consequence many attempt to smuggle themselves through. The writer remembers, in about the part of the route under notice, a “dead-head” who had for several stations managed to elude the notice of the guard, but who was at last detected, and put off at a point a dozen or more miles from the nearest settlement. The “dead-head,” like the stowaway on board ship, of whom as many as fourteen have been concealed on a single vessel, and not one of them discovered by the proper authorities till far out at sea, is an unrecognised institution on the railways of the United States. Perhaps because our ticket system is more rigidly enforced, few attempt to take a free passage on English railways, although it is stated that a sailor was found, some little time since, asleep under a carriage, his arms and legs coiled round the brake-rods, having succeeded in nearly making the trip from London to Liverpool undiscovered. But, then, sailors are hardened to jars and shocks and noises, by being accustomed to the warring of the elements and so forth. The reader may remember that when, some few years ago, a Great Western train intersected and completely cut in two another which crossed its path, a sailor was found asleep on the seat of a half third-class carriage, and that he was quite angry [pg 27]when awoke and told of his narrow escape. All this bears a strong resemblance to digression, so let us return to our subject—“dead heads.” Examples of this tribe have boasted that they have travelled all over the States for nothing. Good-natured guards—always “conductors” in America—will often wink at his presence, but more rigid officials have been known to stop the train outside a long tunnel, or on one side of a dangerous open trestle-work bridge, and peremptorily tell the vagrant to “get!” He has often worked his way clear across the American continent. Turned off one train, kicked off another, left in the snow half-way between far distant stations, charitably allowed a short ride on an open freight car, walking where he may not ride, stealing where it is easier than begging, and vice versâ, he has at last arrived in California, where, to do a glorious country and a generous people justice, not even a tramp is allowed to starve. After all, does not the vagabond deserve something for his enterprise? Perhaps in that land, now far more of corn and hops and wine than of gold, he may, under more auspicious circumstances, become a better and more prosperous man.

Few tourists or travellers of leisure will fail to pay a flying visit to the grand and beautiful lakes and tarns lying among the eternal snows of the Sierra Nevada mountains, which separate the Silver from the Golden State, and are crossed by the Pacific Railway at an elevation of 7,042 feet above the sea level. From the Summit and Truckee stations there are all necessary facilities for reaching Donner, Tahoe, and other lakes, and for a stay among some of the grandest scenery in the world. The space occupied by this chapter would not describe in the barest details the grand mountain peaks, in one case rising to an altitude of 14,500 feet; the forests of magnificent trees; the quieter valleys “in verdure clad;” the waterfalls and cataracts and torrents of this Alpine region, which is within half a day’s journey of San Francisco, and but three or four hours from districts which for eight months of the year have the temperature of Southern Italy. Sufficiently good coaches convey you to leading points, where there are comfortable inns, or, in the summer months, travellers can do a little tent-life and open-air camping with advantage, the climate among the mountains being pure, bracing, and yet warm. On the leading lakes there are boats to be had, and on one or two there are small steamers plying regularly. Fishing and hunting can be indulged in to the heart’s content. The Sierra mountain trout is unsurpassed anywhere; while the sportsman can bag anything from a Californian quail to a grizzly bear—the latter, more especially, if he can. At most of the ordinary places of resort he will get the morning papers of San Francisco the same day, while Truckee boasts of a journal of its own, published, be it observed, 7,000 feet up the mountains![11]

One of the writer’s recollections of the Sierra region is not so pleasant, but then it was under its winter aspect. He had been warned on leaving San Francisco that the railway might be “snowed up,” as it was in 1871-2, when for several weeks there was a blockade, and he was recommended to go to New York viâ Panama. That voyage he had once made, and, besides, had a desire to see the continent in winter, when the journey [pg 28]from the Sierra Nevada Mountains to New York is made through 3,000 miles of snow. So he started, and for twelve hours or so all went well; but at the very “summit” of the railway line, i.e., its highest point among the Sierra Nevada, and near the station of the same name, the train came suddenly to a standstill in the gloom of a long “snow-shed” tunnel. Worse, as it seemed to some, the engine deserted it, and ran away, while the conductor was also absent for a long time. The carriages were not too well lighted, although quite warm enough, thanks to the glowing stoves, while memories of former blockades and half-starved passengers did not aid in reassuring the frozen-in travellers. Few slept that night, and, indeed, in one carriage, where there were several squalling babies and scolding females, it would have been difficult. Some of the older travellers, who had something of Mark Tapleyism about them, did their best to cheer the rest, and passed their wicker-covered demijohns—flasks are hardly enough for a seven days’ journey, which might be indefinitely extended—to those who had not provided themselves; one individual did his best to relieve the monotony with a song; but it fell rather flat, and melancholy reigned supreme.[12] But not for long. About seven next morning there was a commotion; a whistle in the distance; another nearer, which, hoarse as it was, sounded like heavenly music; and in a few minutes the good locomotive arrived, coupled with the train, and took it to the nearest station, where breakfast was ready for all who would partake. And that breakfast! Trout, chicken, venison, hot bread, buckwheat cakes, and molasses, and all the usual, and some other of the unusual, adjuncts of a regular American meal. The traveller must not expect all these luxuries at places nearer the centre of the continent, where, in some cases, all that you will get are beans and bacon, hot bread, tea or coffee, and perhaps stewed (dried) apples or peaches. At such places the excuse is sufficient, for everything is brought from a considerable distance, while the stations themselves have only been erected for the railway, and sometimes do not boast a single dwelling other than those immediately connected with it.

ON THE PACIFIC RAILWAY: THE INTERIOR OF A SNOW-SHED IN THE SIERRA NEVADA.

And so we descend, first to the foot-hills, and then to the plains of sunny California. Evidences of mining, past and present, are to be often seen: flumes and ditches through which the water is rushing rapidly, old shafts, and works, and mills, and boarding-houses. But the glory is departed, or rather changed for the more permanent vineyard and grain-field and orchard. Some of the finest wines and fruits are raised among these said foot-hills. And now we cross the American river, and are in Sacramento, the legislative capital of the State, a city surrounded by pleasant suburbs, handsome villas, and splendid mansions. Thence to San Francisco there is the choice of a ride on the Sacramento River to the Bay, or one of two railways—once so near the Bay City, few care to delay, and so press on. The railway bears you through a highly-cultivated country to Oakland, the Brooklyn of San Francisco, and place of residence for many of its merchant princes. Here all the year round flowers are in full bloom. When leaving California in winter we noted roses, daisies, verbenas, pansies, violets, [pg 29]hollyhocks, calla lillies, and camellias, all growing in the open-air. This is not particularly surprising, for in our own country, in Devonshire and Cornwall, particularly at Penzance, a modified statement of the same nature might be made. At Oakland the railway runs out on a wooden pier or bridge, one mile and a quarter long, to the bay.

Of San Francisco and its glorious bay these pages have already furnished some account. It is the grand depôt for all that concerns commerce and travel between every part of America and much of Europe and the Pacific generally. The successful miner, trader, or farmer, from Nevada, Oregon, Colorado, and all outlying territories, spends his money there; as the metropolis of the coast-trade of all kind centres there. Hence its success and cosmopolitan character.

In speaking of the cosmopolitan characteristics of the Golden City, a traveller (Mr. Carlisle), says that one of the good points, coming, as did he, from the remoteness of Japan, is the proximity of the city to Europe as regards the receipt of news.

“The city of San Francisco is eight hours behind London in the matter of time, [pg 30]and one turns this to good advantage. When her corn-merchants go down to their offices in the morning they find on their desks a report of the Liverpool market of that morning; each morning paper has two or three columns filled with telegrams of the preceding evening from all parts of Europe, and not unfrequently there appears among these telegrams a notice of the following kind:—‘The Times of to-day has an article in which it says,’ &c., &c., giving the substance of that morning’s leader.” The present writer can illustrate this point by an actual occurrence in his own experience. Every reader will remember the terrible explosion in the Regent’s Park, which did so much damage, and which happened about half-past three in the morning. He was then occupying the post of “telegraphic editor,” &c., on the staff of the Alta California, the oldest journal published on that coast. The news of the explosion reached him by telegram at 11.30 the evening before, that is, apparently, before it happened! The Alta therefore was able to give the sad intelligence to all its readers—some few of them as early as four o’clock—the next morning, while the London newspapers of the early editions could naturally have nothing about it, as they were printed before its occurrence.

Mr. W. F. Rae, a writer before quoted in regard to the character which the city unfortunately acquired in early days, says of it:—“From being a bye-word for its lawlessness and licentiousness, the city of San Francisco has become in little more than ten years as moral as Philadelphia, and far more orderly than New York.” The fact is that one must obtain a “permit” to carry a revolver at all, and that permission cannot properly be obtained by anyone of dissipated or dangerous character. A heavy fine is inflicted on any one wearing a pistol without having secured the necessary authority. The same writer says:—“That the Golden State is of extraordinary richness is well known to every traveller. To some, as to me, it may have been a matter of rejoicing to discover that California is also a land teeming with unexpected natural beauties and rare natural delights.” He quotes approvingly Lieutenant-Governor Holden’s speech at a festive meeting held in Sacramento, California, on the completion of the Pacific Railway. “Why, sir,” said the Lieutenant-Governor, a gentleman who had himself done much towards the successful consummation of that grand enterprise, “we have the bravest men, the handsomest women, and the fattest babies of any place under the canopy of heaven!” Baron Hübner, in his published work,[13] says of the climate, “It is a perpetual spring;” and then, alluding to the decreased yield of gold, remarks truly, “Its real riches lie in the fertility of the soil.” And once more, Margharita Weppner, the German lady-traveller before mentioned, says, speaking of a fruit-show she visited:—“What I saw there could only be found in California, for I have never seen anything to equal it, even in the tropics.” She adds, enthusiastically:—“This beautiful city of the golden land I prefer to any other in America. My preference is due to the agreeable kind of life which its people lead, and to the extraordinary salubrity of the climate.” The present writer has preferred to collate from these independent sources rather than from his own long experience; but he can testify to the truth of every one of the above statements. One of the grandest features in San Francisco’s present [pg 31]and assured future success is the fact that the steamship companies of the whole Pacific make it their leading port.

From San Francisco the traveller bent on seeing the world can proceed to New Zealand and Australia, calling at Honolulu in the Hawaïan Islands, and Fiji, on the way; or he can make his way to China, calling at Japan, in steamships having perhaps the most roomy accommodation in the world; or he can reach Panama and South American ports, calling at Mexican ports en route, by steamships which pass over the most pacific part of the Pacific Ocean; or, again, he can make delightful trips northwards to Californian and Oregonian and British Columbian ports; or, once again, southwards to ports of Southern California. These lines are running constantly, and the above list is far from complete. Whither away?

CHAPTER III.

The Pacific Ferry—San Francisco to Japan and China.

The American Steamships—A Celestial Company—Leading Cargoes—Corpses and Coffins—Monotony of the Voyage—Emotions Caused by the Sea—Amusements on Board “Chalked”—Cricket at Sea—Balls Overboard—A Six Days’ Walking Match—Theatricals—Waxworks—The Officers on Board—Engineer’s Life—The Chief Waiter—“Inspection”—Meeting the America—Excitement—Her Subsequent Fate—A Cyclone—At Yokohama—Fairy Land—The Bazaars—Japanese Houses—A Dinner Menu—Music and Dancing—Hongkong, the Gibraltar of China—Charming Victoria—Busy Shanghai—English Enterprise.

A very ordinary trip now-a-days for those rounding the world is that from San Francisco to China, calling at Japan on the way. The steamships of the Pacific Mail Company are those principally employed, and a voyage on such a vessel as the China, which is one of the crack vessels of the service, is one almost invariably of pleasure. The China is a steamship of over 4,000 tons, and cost 800,000 dollars, or, roughly, £160,000 sterling. She will often carry 2,000 tons of tea on a return voyage, to say nothing of perhaps from five to fifteen hundred Chinamen. A traveller[14] already referred to states, that with only 580 on board half a ton of rice had to be served out daily, with a modicum of meat and vegetables. One of the leading cargoes on the outward trip from San Francisco is corpses and coffins, few Chinamen being ever buried out of their native land. In the splendid and roomy saloons of these steamers there are always Chinese waiters, who are said to be most obliging, and noiseless in their motions. Negro waiters are civil and assiduous enough in their attendance, but are always fussy; in this respect “John” is a great improvement on “Sambo.”

“An additional proof,” said a leading journal “of the new vitality infused into that long inert mass, the Chinese Empire, has just been supplied from San Francisco,” and the writer goes on to describe a new development of their mercantile enterprise. It seems that there has been in existence for some time past an association termed the Chinese Merchants’ Steamship Company, the stockholders of which are wealthy [pg 32]native merchants and mandarins, who own many coasting steamers. The company is now about to start a line from China to the Sandwich Islands and San Francisco, and it is not improbable that the Chinese emigrants may prefer these steamers to any other. The manager of this Celestial “P. and O.” is one Tong Ken Sing, a shrewd native of Singapore; and, continues the writer, “under the enlightened control of this man of his epoch, who is equally at home with tails and taels, the company is sure to succeed.”

After leaving the “Golden Gate,” the entrance to the Bay of San Francisco, and passing the rocky Farralones, islands whence a company brings a million of sea-birds’ eggs to the city yearly, the voyager by this route will not see land till Japan is reached. The steamships stop nowhere en route. The passengers must depend on their own resources aboard for amusement, and every passing sail becomes an object of greatest interest. Yet still there is always the sea itself, in its varying aspects of placid or turbulent grandeur. “The appearance of the open sea,” says Frédol, “far from the shore—the boundless ocean—is to the man who loves to create a world of his own, in which he can freely exercise his thoughts, filled with sublime ideas of the Infinite. His searching eye rests upon the far-distant horizon; he sees there the ocean and the heavens meeting in a vapoury outline, where the stars ascend and descend, appear and disappear in their turn. Presently this everlasting change in nature awakens in him a vague feeling of that sadness ‘which,’ says Humboldt, ‘lies at the root of all our heartfelt joys.’ ” When the Breton fisherman or mariner puts to sea, his touching prayer is, “Keep me, my God! my boat is so small, and Thy ocean so wide!” “We find in the sea,” says Lacepède, “unity and diversity, which constitute its beauty; grandeur and simplicity, which give it sublimity; puissance and immensity, which command our wonder.” That immense expanse of water is no mere liquid desert; it teems with life, however little that life may be visible. The inhabitants of the water through which the good ship ploughs her way are as numerous as those of the solid earth; although, unless the great sea-serpent makes its fitful appearance, the experience of a traveller over the Pacific by this route will be repeated. Says he:—

“Few signs of life are visible outside the vessel. Occasionally a whale is reported in sight, but for many days most of the passengers are inclined to think it is only something very ‘like one,’ till, as the days pass, every person has caught a glimpse of a spout of water suddenly shooting up from the sea without any apparent reason, or of a black line cutting through the blue surface for a moment, and then disappearing to unknown depths. Occasionally, too, one or more sea-birds are seen following in the vessel’s wake, sweeping gracefully across and again across the white band of foam, and with difficulty keeping down their natural pace to that of the steam-driven monster. These birds are of two kinds only: the ‘Mother Carey’s Chicken,’ and another, called by the sailors the ‘Cape Hen’—a brown bird, rather larger and longer in the wing than a sea-gull. Both birds are visible when we are in mid-ocean, 1,000 miles at least from the nearest dry land.” The writer of these pages has seen whales, in the North Pacific, keep up with the vessel on which he was a passenger for half an hour or more together. On one occasion a large whale was swimming abreast of the steamer so closely that rifle and pistol shots were fired at it, some undoubtedly hitting their mark, yet the great [pg 33]mammal did not show the slightest symptoms of even temporary annoyance, and there is reason to believe was not much more hurt by the shots than would the targets at Wimbledon be affected by a shower of peas.

Occasionally a little diversity and profit are got out of passengers by the sailors when they go for the first time on the fo’castle. The latter draw on the deck a chalk line quickly round the former, and each visitor so “chalked,” as it is called, must pay a fine in the shape of a bottle of rum. This secures one, however, the freedom of the ship ever after.

A CRICKET-MATCH ON BOARD SHIP.

One of the deck games popular on long voyages is a form of quoits, played with rings and chalked spaces, or, in some cases, on a spike driven into the deck. A traveller[15] gives an amusing account of a cricket club formed on the vessel in which he was a passenger. Fancy playing cricket at sea! He says:—“The Lord Warden cricket-ground is on the main deck, and, owing to the somewhat limited space at the disposal of the ten members, single-wicket matches are the invariable rule. The stumps, which are fixed in a frame so as to remain steady on the deck, are about two feet in height, and of course bails are provided, but never used. Of bats the club boasts not a few, of varied construction. Of these the majority are fashioned out of a thick deal plank, and [pg 34]soon go to pieces; but one of elm, which was christened off Cape de Verde, survived many weeks of hard usage, and was more precious to the club than the most expensive of Cobbett’s productions. It was fully intended by a member of the Marylebone Club to obtain for this tough little piece of elm a final resting-place in the Pavilion at Lord’s, but unfortunately the ‘leviathan hitter,’ in attempting a huge drive, let it slip out of his hands, and it is lost to us for ever.” The boatswain furnished spun-yarn balls at sixpence each, but these seldom had a long life, four or five being frequently hit overboard in the course of an afternoon’s play; nearly 300 were exhausted on the voyage. “The wicket,” continues the narrator, “is pitched just in front of the weather poop-ladder, the bowling-crease being thirteen yards further forward, by the side of the deck-house. Behind the bowler stands an out-field, while mid-on or mid-off, according to which tack the ship is on, has his back to the midshipmen’s berth, and has also occasionally to climb over the boom-board above it, and search for a lost ball among a chaos of boats and spare spars.... Run-getting on board ship is a matter of difficulty, the ball having the supremacy over the bat, which is exactly reversed on shore. A cricketer who thinks but little of the side-hill at Lord’s would find himself thoroughly non-plussed by the incline of a ship’s deck in a stiff breeze. A good eye and hard straight driving effected much, but a steady defence and the scientific ‘placing’ of the ball under the winch often succeeded equally well, especially on a wet wicket. The highest score of the season was eighteen, which included two hits on to the forecastle, feats of very rare occurrence.” The games were highly popular, and were watched by appreciative assemblages of the passengers. On the same vessel a glee club was organised, and an evening in Christmas week was devoted to theatricals, by the “Shooting Stars of the Southern Seas.” Dancing is common enough on board, and, of course, is often pursued under difficulties; a sudden lurch of the ship may throw a number of couples off their feet or tumble them in a chaotic heap.

Another traveller[16] gives us some amusing notes on the private theatricals performed on board the famous old steamship Great Britain. He was stage manager, and says:—“I had a great deal to do, as I was responsible for dresses, and had to see that everybody was ready. I had among other things to procure a chignon. I was in a dilemma, as I did not like to ask a lady for the loan of one, even where no doubt existed as to her wearing false hair; so at last I procured some oakum from the carpenter, and made three large sausages, and it was pronounced a success. The stage is erected in the saloon, and we had footlights, with a gorgeous screen of flags, &c.” Special prologues were written for these entertainments, one of which, on the occasion of performing the “Taming of a Tiger” and the “Area Belle,” ran as follows:—

“Far from Australia or from British home,

Across wide ocean’s trackless breast we roam;

And though our ship both swift and steady speeds,

Yet dreary week to dreary week succeeds.

Our joys restricted, and our pleasures few,

We all must own the prospect’s rather blue.

At such a time to fill the vacant place,

A chosen few have taken heart of grace,

And tho’ unused the actor’s part to fill,

Will show, if not the deed, at least the will.”

Then came mention of some of the amateurs who had already played before the passengers:—

“Yet not all novices—the veteran Flood

You’ve seen before, and you’ve pronounced him good;

The modest Griffiths, and the blushing Lance,

Joy of the fair and hero of the dance;”

and so forth. The performance took place while the vessel was constantly rolling. Mr. Laird says that he had to think almost as much of his equilibrium as of anything else; but as he had always to appear trembling before the presence of his master in the piece, it did pretty well, except in one lurch, when he went flying in an undignified manner across the stage into the arms of the prompter.

On another occasion an entertainment, entitled “Mrs. Jarley’s Waxworks,” was presented. Five children were dressed up to represent different characters, and pretence was made of winding them up to make them go. The best was a cannibal, converted to be a missionary; another personated Fair Rosamond; and a third the Marquis of Lorne. The missionary handed tracts about, and Queen Eleanor alternately presented a dagger and a cup of cold poison to Fair Rosamond. A regularly-organised concert followed, while a farce and spoken epilogue concluded this, the last performance on board the Great Britain. After speaking of the voyage and the fun on board, it continued:—

“And now our sweet communion must shortly see its close,

And never more, till next time, shall we share in joys like those;

No more the fragrant sea-pie or delectable burgoo,

No more on the same plate be seen fish, cheese, and Irish stew.

* * * * * * *

No longer Mrs. Jarley’s works our mimic stage shall grace,

Or the little missionary-eater show his little face.

Of Mrs. J. I would not say one harsh word if I could;

No use to tread upon her toes, because they’re only wood.

No more the sailor’s plaintive song with tears our eyes shall dim,

No more on Sunday morning shall we sing the Evening Hymn;”

the fact being that a clergyman on board had once inadvertently chosen the latter for morning service! The epilogue concluded by wishing good luck to all the officers and men and to the good old ship.

LEAVING THE COAST OF CALIFORNIA.

Baron Hübner has given us, in his published work before quoted, some interesting reminiscences of, and graphic notes on, his voyage to Japan from San Francisco. A few extracts may be permitted.

“July 4.—The sky is pearly grey. The vessel is all painted white: masts, deck-cabins, deck, tarpaulins, benches—all are white. This deck, from poop to prow, is all in one piece, and makes a famous walk. Almost all the morning I am alone there. The first-class passengers get up very late; the second-class—that is, the Chinese—not at all. [pg 36]They go to bed at San Francisco, and never leave their berths till they reach their destination. You never see one of them on deck. The sailors, having done their duty, disappear likewise. And how easy that duty is in such weather! On leaving the Golden Gate the sails were hoisted, and have remained untouched ever since. The breeze is just strong enough to fill them and keep us steady. The result is a complete calm. The smoke ascends up to heaven in a straight line. So the sailors have a fine time of it. They sleep, smoke, or play down-stairs with their companions. The two men at the helm—these two are Americans—are equally invisible, for a watch-tower hides them from sight, as well as the rudder and the officer of the watch. I have thus got the deck of this immense ship entirely to myself. I pace it from one end to the other, four hundred feet backwards and forwards. The only impediment is a transverse bar of iron, as high as one’s head, which binds in the middle the two sides of the ship. It is painted white, like all the rest, and is difficult to see. In every position in life there is always the worm in the bud or thorn in the flesh—or, at any rate, some dark spot. On board the China the dark spot for me is that detestable white bar. Not only am I perpetually knocking [pg 37]my head against it, but it reminds me unpleasantly of the frailty of human things. It is very thin, and yet, if I am to believe the engineer, it is this bar alone which, in very bad weather, prevents the enormous shell of the boat from breaking in half. There are moments when one’s life hangs on a thread; here it hangs on an iron bar. That is better, perhaps, but it is not enough.”

The fine vessels of the company then running were, although perhaps the most commodious in the world, hardly the safest. The distance between San Francisco and Japan is 5,000 miles, and, barring a few hundred miles on the coasts of the latter, the ocean is almost one grand calm lake. But cyclones occur in the Japanese seas when the high-built American boats are not safe.

Baron Hübner gives us some notes on the passengers on board, which included nine nationalities. Among them was a dignified and venerable Parsee merchant, a merchant prince in his way, who had wished to study European manners, and so had proceeded as far as San Francisco. What he saw there impressed him so unfavourably, that he immediately took passage back again. What he observed, indeed, filled him with disgust. “The men,” said he, “what a lack of dignity! Never in the streets of our towns will you be shocked by the sight of drunkards and bad women.”

Hübner gives also some sketches of the officers on board. The chief engineer is described as a thoughtful and meditative man—a Roman Catholic, deeply imbued with the spirit of religious fervour, and spending his time in the alternate study of theology and practical mechanics. His cabin, opening on the one side to the deck and on the other to the machinery, contained a well-selected, though small, library of scientific and classical books, and was adorned by pots of flowers, which he managed to keep alive by constant care, in spite of the sea-breezes, for they had been given to him by his young and beautiful wife, whose portrait hung upon the wall. For a couple of weeks only in each three months could he see his better half.

“Sweetly blows the western wind

Softly o’er the rippling sea,

And thy sailor’s constant mind

Ever turns to thee.

Though the north wind may arise,

And the waves dash madly by,

Though the storm should rend the skies,

And vivid lightnings round me fly;

Then I love thee more and more,

Then art thou more dear to me,

And I sigh for that dear shore

Distant o’er the sea.”

The Baron describes the waiters on board as follows:—“The head waiter is a native of Hamburg. He and his white comrade lead an easy life; they confine their labours to overlooking the Chinese men, and pass the rest of their time in flirting with the ladies’-maids. These are the only two idlers in the service. Thirty-two Chinamen do the duties of waiters on the passengers and at table. Although short, they look well enough with their black caps, their equally black pig-tails, which go down to their heels, their dark-[pg 38]blue tunics, their large white trousers, their gaiters or white stockings, and their black felt shoes with strong white soles. They form themselves into symmetrical groups, and do everything with method. Fancy a huge cabin, in which the small table of twenty-two guests is lost, with all these little Chinamen fluttering round them and serving them in the most respectful manner, without making any noise. The Hamburg chief, idly leaning against a console, with one hand in his trousers’ pocket, directs with the forefinger of the other the evolutions of his docile squadron.” The daily inspection, common on all well-regulated passenger ships, is thus described:—

“July 6.—Every day, at eleven o’clock in the morning and at eight o’clock in the evening, the captain, followed by the purser, makes the rounds of the ship. In that of the morning all the cabin-doors are opened, only excepting those of the ladies; but the moment these have gone out the captain visits them with equal care. If any matches are discovered they are pitilessly confiscated. This morning the captain invited me to accompany him, and I could convince myself with my own eyes of the perfect order and discipline which reign everywhere. Nothing was more tempting than that department which one greatly avoids, the kitchens. The head cook and his assistants, all Germans, did the honours of their domain. Every man was at his post, and only anxious to show the visitors the most secret corners of his department. It was like an examination of conscience carefully made. The provision and store-rooms were admirable. Everything was of the first and best quality; everything was in abundance; everything was classed and ticketed like the drugs in a chemist’s shop. The Chinese quarter is on the lower deck. We have about 800 on board. They are all in their berths, smoking and talking, and enjoying the rare pleasure in their lives of being able to spend five weeks in complete idleness. In spite of the great number of men penned into so comparatively small a space, the ventilation is so well managed that there is neither closeness nor bad smells. The captain inspects every hole and corner, literally everything—and everywhere we found the same extraordinary cleanliness. One small space is reserved for the opium-eaters or smokers; and we saw these victims of a fatal habit, some eagerly inhaling the poison, others already feeling its effects. Lying on their backs and fast asleep, their deadly-pale features gave them the look of corpses.”

A common occurrence, but always of great interest to the passengers, is thus described:—

“July 7.—Contrary to our usual sleepy habits, we are all to-day in a state of excitement and agitation. The China is to come to the point where it ought to meet the America, which was to leave Hong-Kong five-and-twenty days ago. Our top-sails are filled with little Chinamen, whose eager eyes are fixed on the horizon. The captain and officers are standing close to the bowsprit, their telescopes pointed in the same direction. Even my Spanish friend has left his engine, his flower-pots, and his wife’s portrait, to gaze at the blue sea, slightly rippled, but, as usual, without a speck of a sail. No America! The captain’s heart is in his shoes. He consults his charts, his instruments, his officers, all in vain. The day passes without the steamer being signalled. The dinner is silent and sad. Every one seems preoccupied, and the captain is evidently anxious. It seems that the directors of the company make a point of their two boats meeting. It is [pg 39]to them a proof that their captains have followed a straight course, and that the San Francisco boat has crossed, without any accident, a third of the Pacific. The passengers gladly avail themselves of this precious opportunity to write to their friends. For the captains themselves it is a question of honour. They like to show their skill in this way, and their cleverness in being able, despite the variable and imperfectly-understood currents of the Pacific, to make a straight course across this enormous sheet of water.

“July 8.—At five o’clock in the morning the second officer rushed into my cabin—‘The America[17] is in sight!’ I throw on my clothes and tumble on deck. The morning is beautiful, and this colossal steamer, the largest after the Great Eastern, draws near majestically. The usual salutes are exchanged, and the America’s gig brings us an extract from their log, the list of the passengers, the newspapers from Hong-Kong, Shanghai, and Yokohama, and, which is essential, takes charge of our letters for America and Europe. A few moments after she resumes her course. What a grand and imposing sight! At six o’clock she has already disappeared behind the horizon. At the moment of meeting we had run exactly 1,500 miles—that is, half the distance between England and New York.”

The China encountered a cyclone, or rather the outer edge of one, which is graphically described by Hübner. He says:—“At this moment the ocean was really magnificent. In the boiling sea the foam was driven horizontally towards the east. The water was positively inky, with here and there whitish gleams of light. The sky was iron-grey; to the west a curtain of the same colour, but darker. The thermometer was still falling rapidly. In the air above the waves I suddenly saw a cloud of white flakes; they were little bits of Joss paper which the Chinese were throwing into the sea to appease their gods. I passed before the open door of the engineer; he was watering his plants. The passengers were all gathered together in the saloon. Some of them were moved almost to tears. At twelve o’clock the sky cleared a little, and the faces brightened considerably. I have often remarked that people when in danger, whether real or imaginary, are like children; the slightest thing will make them laugh or cry. The Bombay master-baker, the Chinese merchant, and the two Japanese, struck me by their imperturbability. The first whispered in my ear, ‘The company is very unwise to have a Chinese crew; the Malays are much better. Chinese sailors are scared at the least danger, and would be the first to make off in the lifeboats.’ Fung-Tang has an equally bad opinion of his fellow-countrymen. He says to me, ‘Chinese good men, very good; bad sailors, very bad!’ I reply, ‘If we go to the bottom, what will become of Fung-Tang?’ He replies, ‘If good, place above; if bad, below stairs, punished.’

“July 20.—In the middle of the night the ocean suddenly calmed. The China has got out of the region of the cyclone. The weather is delicious; the sea like glass. But at [pg 40]four o’clock in the afternoon we suddenly find ourselves amidst colossal waves; and yet there is not a breath of wind. They tell us that this was probably yesterday the centre of the typhoon. It has exhausted itself or gone elsewhere; but the sea which it lashed into fury is still agitated, like the pulse of a fever patient after the fit is over.”

Yokohama, whose very name signifies “across the sea and shore,” has been before briefly described in these pages. Travellers have given some interesting accounts of it, and as in a tour round the world it would form one of the leading stopping-places, some further allusion to it may be permitted.

Baron Hübner says in effect that at every step one takes there one asks if it be not all a dream, a fairy tale, a story of the thousand-and-one nights. Arriving there from San Francisco, the step from American to Oriental civilisation is particularly noticed. The Baron refers particularly to the courtesy and extreme cleanliness of the people. Even the coolies, bearing great cases or baskets slung on bamboos resting on their athletic shoulders, stop to chatter and laugh so pleasantly that labour seems to have lost half its curse. “Misery,” says he, “is unknown amongst them; so also is luxury.” If the Japanese have arrived at this happy mean it would be a great pity to disturb their peaceful condition by the introduction of a so-called civilisation, and its attendant expenses and new wants.

“What adds to the charm of the scene,” says the same authority, “is the smiling look of the country, and the intense beauty, at this season (summer), of the setting sun. The sky is positively crimson, with great clouds of Sèvres blue; the long promontory of Thanagawa is inundated with mother-of-pearl; and on the purpled violet sea the pale shadows of the ships and junks stand out against the sky, the one rocked by the swell, the others gliding across the water like phantoms.” The winter in Japan is cold enough, as Mrs. Brassey discovered;[18] for icicles were hanging from the shrouds and riggings of the Sunbeam.

Mrs. Brassey gives some life-like pictures from Yokohama.

“Having landed,” says she, “we went with the Consul to the native town to see the curio shops, which are a speciality of the place. The inhabitants are wonderfully clever at making all sorts of curiosities, and the manufactories of so called ‘antique bronzes’ and ‘old china’ are two of the most wonderful sights in Yokohama. The way in which they scrape, crack, chip, mend, and colour the various articles, cover them with dust, partially clean them, and imitate the marks and signatures of celebrated makers, is more creditable to their ingenuity than to their honesty. Still, there are a good many genuine old relics from the temples and from the large houses of the reduced Daimios to be picked up, if you go the right way to work, though the supply is limited.

“Dealers are plentiful, and travellers, especially from America, are increasing in numbers. When we first made acquaintance with the shops we thought they seemed full of beautiful things, but even one day’s shopping, in the company of experienced people, has educated our taste and taught us a great deal; though we have still much to learn. There are very respectable-looking lacquer cabinets, ranging in price from 5s. to £20. But they are only made for the foreign market. No such things exist in a Japanese home.”

A really fine piece of old lacquer is often worth a couple of hundred pounds.

“It is said that the modern Japanese have lost the art of lacquer-making; and as an illustration I was told that many beautiful articles of lacquer, old and new, had been sent from this country to the Vienna Exhibition in 1873, but the price put on them was so exorbitant that few were sold, and nearly all had to be sent back to Japan. Just as the ship with these things on board reached the Gulf of Jeddo, she struck on a rock and sank in shallow water. A month or two ago a successful attempt was made to raise her and to recover the cargo, when it was found that the new lacquer had been reduced to a state of pulp, while the old was not in the least damaged. I tell you the tale as it was told to me.

A STREET IN JAPAN.

“After a long day’s shopping, we went to dine, in real Japanese fashion, at a Japanese tea-house. The establishment was kept by a very pleasant woman, who received us at the door, and who herself removed our exceedingly dirty boots before allowing us to step on to her clean mats. This was all very well, as far as it went; but she might as well have supplied us with some substitute for the objectionable articles, for it was a bitterly cold night, and the highly-polished wood passages and steep staircase felt very cold to our shoeless feet. The apartment we were shown into was so exact a type of a room in any Japanese house that I may as well describe it once for all. The wood-work of the roof and the framework of the screens were all made of a handsome dark polished wood, not unlike walnut.

“The exterior walls under the verandah, as well as partitions between the other rooms, were simply wooden lattice-work screens covered with white paper, and sliding in grooves, so that you could walk in or out at any part of the wall you chose, and it was, in like manner, impossible to say whence the next comer would make his appearance; doors and windows are by this arrangement rendered unnecessary, and do not exist. You open a little bit of your wall [pg 42]if you want to look out, and a bigger bit if you want to step out. The floor was covered with several thicknesses of very fine mats, each about six feet long by three broad, deliciously soft to walk upon. All mats in Japan are of the same size, and everything connected with house-building is measured by this standard. Once you have prepared your foundations and wood-work of the dimensions of so many mats, it is the easiest thing in the world to go to a shop and buy a house ready-made, which you can then set up and furnish in the scanty Japanese fashion in a couple of days.

“On one side of the room was a slightly raised daïs, about four inches from the floor. This was the seat of honour. On it had been placed a stool, a little bronze ornament, and a china vase, with a branch of cherry-blossom and a few flag-leaves gracefully arranged. On the wall behind hung pictures, which are changed every month, according to the season of the year. There was no other furniture of any sort in the room. Four nice-looking Japanese girls brought us thick cotton quilts to sit upon, and braziers full of burning charcoal to warm ourselves by. In the centre of the group another brazier was placed, protected by a square wooden grating, and over the whole they laid a large silk eider-down quilt, to retain the heat: this is the way in which all the rooms, even bed-rooms, are warmed in Japan, and the result is that fires are of very frequent occurrence. The brazier is kicked over by some restless or careless person, and in a moment the whole place is in a blaze.”

The following gives a description of a Japanese meal:—“Presently the eider-down and brazier were removed, and our dinner was brought in. A little lacquer table, about six inches high, on which were arrayed a pair of chop-sticks, a basin of soup, a bowl for rice, a saki cup, and a basin of hot water, was placed before each person, whilst the four Japanese maidens sat in our midst, with fires to keep the saki hot and to light the tiny pipes with which they were provided, and from which they wished us to take a whiff after each dish. Saki is a sort of spirit distilled from rice, always drunk hot out of small cups. In this state it is not disagreeable, but we found it exceedingly nasty when cold.

“Everything was well cooked and served, though the ingredients of some of the dishes, as will be seen from the following bill of fare, were rather strange to our ideas. Still, they were all eatable, and most of them really palatable.

Soup.
Shrimps and Seaweeds.
Prawns, Egg Omelette, and Preserved Grapes.
Fried Fish, Spinach, Young Rushes, and Young Ginger.
Raw Fish, Mustard and Cress, Horseradish, and Soy.
Thick Soup of Egg, Fish, Mushrooms, and Spinach; Grilled Fish.
Fried Chicken and Bamboo Shoots.
Turnip-Tops and Root, Pickled.
Rice ad libitum in a large bowl.
Hot Saki, Pipes, and Tea.

“The meal concluded with an enormous lacquer box of rice, from which all our bowls were filled; the rice being thence conveyed to our mouths by means of chop-sticks. We managed very well with these substitutes for spoons and forks, the knack of using which, to a certain extent, is soon acquired. The long intervals between the dishes were beguiled with songs, [pg 43]music, and dancing, performed by professional singing and dancing girls. The music was somewhat harsh and monotonous, but the songs sounded harmonious, and the dancing was graceful, though it was rather posturing than dancing, great use being made of the fan and the long trailing skirts. The girls, who were pretty, wore peculiar dresses to indicate their calling, and seemed of an entirely different stamp from the quiet, simply-dressed waitresses whom we found so attentive to our wants. Still, they all looked cheery, light-hearted, simple creatures, and appeared to enjoy immensely the little childish games they played amongst themselves between whiles.

“After dinner we had some real Japanese tea, tasting exactly like a little hot water poured on very fragrant new-mown hay. Then, after a brief visit to the kitchen, which, though small, was beautifully clean, we received our boots, and were bowed out by our pleasant hostess and her attentive handmaidens.”

Recommending the perusal of the interesting works last quoted, let us finish our trip on paper at its natural termination, so far as the route from San Francisco is concerned, in China, to which country the American vessels take us in a week or so.

Hong Kong is a commercial port of the first order, but has not come up to the expectations once made of it. It has not progressed in the same ratio as has Shanghai. Its situation is picturesque. “Fancy to yourself the rock of Gibraltar, on a large scale, looking to the north. There facing us is terra firma. Let us scramble up to the flag-staff, proudly standing on the highest peak of the mountain. The sun, which is already low, bathes sky, earth, and sea in crude, fantastic, exaggerated lights. Woe be to the painter who should dare reproduce such effects! Happy would he be if he could succeed!

“Towards the south, the sun and the fogs are fighting over the islands, which at this moment stand out in black groups on a liquid gold ground, framed in silver. Towards the north we look over the town, officially called Victoria, and vulgarly Hong Kong. It is stretched out at our feet, but we only perceive the roofs, the courts, and the streets; further on the roadstead is crowded with frigates, corvettes, gun-boats, steamers belonging to the great companies, and an infinity of smaller steam and sailing vessels of less tonnage. In front of us, at three or four miles distance, is a high chain of rocks, bare and rugged, but coloured by the setting sun with tints of rose colour and crimson, resembling a huge coral bracelet. That is the continent. Towards the west are the two passages which lead to Canton and Macao; to the north-east is a third passage, by which we ourselves have come. The sea here is like a lake, bordered on one side by the rocks of terra firma, and on the other by the peaks and summits of the Hong Kong cliffs. I have seen in many other lands softer and more harmonious effects of light, but I never saw any so strange.

“Victoria is charming, sympathetic, and imposing: English and yet tropical—a mixture of cottages and palaces. Nowhere can be found a happier combination between the poetry of nature and the prose of commercial life; between English comfort and the intoxicating exuberance of the south. The streets, which are well macadamised, well kept, and beautifully clean, run in a serpentine fashion along the rock, sometimes between houses, of which the rather pretentious façades are coquettishly veiled by the verandahs, sometimes between gardens, bamboo hedges, or stone balustrades. It is like Ventnor or Shanklin seen through a magnifying-glass and under a jet of electric light. Everywhere there are fine trees—banians, bamboos, [pg 44]and pines. One may go on foot from one end of Hong Kong to the other, and yet always be in the shade. No one dreams of walking. Nothing is to be seen but chairs or palanquins. The coolies, their heads sheltered by enormous straw hats, carry you at a rattling pace. Nothing can be more delicious than a night promenade in an open sedan-chair. In the lower part of the town the scene is most animated and busy; officers and soldiers in red uniforms and with swarthy complexions (Sepoys), Parsees, Hindoos, Chinese, Malays, European ladies in elegant toilets, and men and women with yellowish skins, dressed like Europeans (half-caste Portuguese). The higher you climb the quieter you find it. Insensibly the town turns into country. Scramble up still a little higher, and you are in the middle of rocks, bare of trees, but covered with odoriferous shrubs, and traversed by a fine macadamised road, with glimpses of views here and there of marvellous beauty.”[19]

THE CUSTOM HOUSE, SHANGHAI.

Shanghai, as another leading port, would naturally be visited by the tourist of leisure, and it affords a wonderful example of English enterprise. It is by nature the port of Suchow, ninety miles up the great Yang-tse-Kiang river. Near the city its flat, green, cultivated [pg 45]banks recall the Humber in Yorkshire. The port is crowded with foreign shipping: great American steamships, the boats of the English P. and O. Company, those of the French “Messageries,” merchant steamers straight from London, Liverpool, and Glasgow, and sailing vessels in numbers. In a picturesque point of view the place has little to recommend it, but commercially it is a lively place, nine-tenths of the capital employed being English, and the white population counting at least six Englishmen to all the rest of the foreigners put together. There are three “concessions,” i.e., tracts ceded by the Chinese to the English, French, and Americans, for commercial purposes. Stone being scarce, these concessions are fringed by enormous wooden wharves, slips, and piers, outside the warehouses, depôts, and stores. There are streets of well-filled shops, where everything is to be obtained that could be bought in the Strand or Oxford Street. In this point of view, Hübner tells us, neither Yokohama nor any other European town in Asia, saving Calcutta and Bombay, can bear a comparison with Shanghai. The Chinese do not adopt numerals for their shops and warehouses, but use mottoes and descriptive titles, and the great English houses have adopted the custom of the country. Messrs. Dent & Co. have for their nom de maison, “Precious and Obliging,” while Messrs. Jardine & Co. are known, not as number 45, or what-not, but as “Honest and Harmonious.”

VIEW OF HONOLULU, SANDWICH ISLANDS.

CHAPTER IV.

The Pacific Ferry.—Another Route.

The Hawaiian Islands—King and Parliament—Pleasant Honolulu—A Government Hotel—Honeysuckle-covered Theatre—Productions of the Islands—Grand Volcanoes—Ravages of Lava Streams and Earthquakes—Off to Fiji—A Rapidly Christianised People—A Native Hut—Dinner—Kandavu—The Bush—Fruit-laden Canoes—Strange Ideas of Value—New Zealand—Its Features—Intense English Feeling—The New Zealand Company and its Iniquities—The Maories—Trollope’s Testimony—Facts about Cannibalism—A Chief on Bagpipes—Australia—Beauty of Sydney Harbour—Its Fortifications—Volunteers—Its War-fleet of One—Handsome Melbourne—Absence of Squalor—No Workhouses Required—The Benevolent Asylums—Splendid Place for Working Men—Cheapness of Meat, &c.—Wages in Town and Country—Life in the Bush—“Knocking Down One’s Cheque”—Gold, Coal, and Iron.

A popular route now to New Zealand and Australia is that viâ San Francisco, Honolulu, and Fiji, the bulk of the voyage being usually over the quieter parts of the Pacific; it takes the passenger, of course, through the tropics.

Honolulu, the capital of the Hawaiian or Sandwich Islands, is now a civilised and pleasant city, while the natural attractions of the islands themselves are many and varied. One need not now fear the fate of poor Captain Cook. Most of the natives, of whom there are 50,000, are clothed in semi-European style: the men in coats and trousers of nankeen, and the women more picturesquely clad in long robes fastened round the neck, and pretty often of pink or some other bright colour. There is a white population of some 10,000 souls scattered over the islands, a large proportion of whom are English and American. Honolulu is the Government centre and residence of King Kalakau, who used to be called “Calico” in the United States, and who, in fact, is a very slightly tinted, [pg 46]good-looking, and most intelligent gentleman. The Ex-Queen Emma, who visited England some years ago, has a villa beautifully situated a few miles out of town. The king devotes his energies to bettering the condition of his people, and some few years ago, when the money was voted to build a new palace, declined to accept it, at least for two years. The Hawaiian Parliament consists of a House of seventeen nobles and twenty-eight commoners, who, strange to say, sit in the same hall, their votes being of equal weight. There are always several Europeans or Americans in this council.

Mr. Guillemard thus describes Honolulu[20]:—“The town, which is built on the low land bordering the shore—partly, indeed, on land reclaimed from the sea, thanks to the industry of the architects of the coral reef—looks mean and insignificant from the harbour, but on going ashore to breakfast we get glimpses of fine public buildings and numerous shops and stores, of neat houses nestling among bowers of shrubs and flowers, and evidences of a busy trade and considerable population. The streets are narrow, and the houses built of wood, without any attempt at decoration or even uniformity. In the by-streets or lanes pretty verandah-girt villas peep out from shrubberies of tropical foliage, honeysuckle, roses, lilies, and a hundred flowers strange to English eyes. Tiny fountains are sending sparkling jets of water up in the hot, still air; and other music is not wanting, for here and there we hear the tinkle of a distant piano, telling us that early rising is the rule in Honolulu, and suggesting as a consequence a siesta at mid-day.

“But here we are at the grand Hawaiian Hotel, a fine verandahed building, standing back from the road in a pretty garden, the green lawn, cool deep shade, and trickling fountain of which are doubly grateful after the glare of the scorching sunlight, scorching even though it is not yet seven a.m. The theatre, half-hidden by its wealth of honeysuckle and fan-palm, is not fifty yards distant, but is quite thrown into insignificance by the hotel. This was built by Government, at a cost of £25,000, and is admirably planned and appointed.” Its large airy rooms and cool verandahs, shaded with masses of passion flowers, its excellent food and iced American drinks, all combine to make it a capital resting-place.

In the streets Mr. Guillemard noted bevies of gaily-attired girls on horseback, their robes being gathered in at the waist with bright scarves, which fling their folds far over the horses’ tails. Their jaunty straw hats were wreathed with flowers, and now and then some dark-eyed beauty would be found wearing a necklace of blossoms. The girls rode astride up and down the main streets, making them ring again with their merry laughter. Mosquitoes were abundant, and, as some compensation, so also were delicious melons, guavas, mangoes, bananas, and commoner fruit.

The sugar-cane was first grown on these islands in 1820; now over 20,000,000 pounds of sugar are produced annually by the aid of Hawaiian and Chinese labour and steam-mills. Not a quarter of the land suitable for this purpose is yet under cultivation, though some of the plantations are of thousands of acres in extent. Hides and wool are staple exports.

A few hours’ sail from Honolulu some of the largest and most wonderful volcanoes in the world are to be found. Two of them, Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea, are each over 13,000 feet in elevation. The eruptions from the great crater of Kilauea, which is ten miles in circumference, are something fearful. One explosion ejected streams of red mud three miles, killing thirty-one people and 500 head of cattle. This was followed by several earthquakes, which destroyed a number of houses. These, again, were succeeded by a great earthquake wave, during the continuance of which three villages were swept away and seventy people killed. Next a new crater formed upon Mauna Loa, from which rose four fountains of red-hot lava to a height of 600 feet. A lava stream, eight to ten miles long, and half a mile wide in some places, carried all before it. In one place it tumbled, in a molten cataract of fiery liquid, over a precipice several hundred feet in height. The interior of Hawaii is a vast underground lake of fire, and were it not for the safety-valves provided by Nature in the form of craters, it would be shaken to pieces by successive earthquakes.

THE VOLCANOES OF MAUNA LOA AND MAUNA KEA, SANDWICH ISLANDS (FROM THE SEA).

And now the passenger has before him a fortnight of the most tranquil part of the ocean called the Pacific. He must not be surprised if the heat rises to 90° or so in the saloon. The distance from San Francisco to Sydney direct is 6,500 miles, and Fiji is naturally en route; the detour to New Zealand considerably increases the length of the voyage. It will be remembered that these islands were formally annexed to Britain in 1874, after vain attempts at a mixed native and European government. The population was then 140,000; in a year or two afterwards 40,000 of the poor natives fell victims to the measles, another of the importations apparently inseparable from civilisation. The Wesleyan missionaries, in particular, have worked with so much zeal in these islands that more than half the people are Christians. There are 600 chapels in the 140 islands comprising the Fiji group. Formerly the natives were the worst kind of cannibals. They not merely killed and ate the victims of their island wars, but no shipwrecked or helpless person was safe among them. Numbers were slain at the caprice of the chiefs, especially at the building of a house or canoe, or at the reception of a native embassy. Widows were strangled at the death of their husbands, and slaves killed on the decease of their masters. The introduction of Christianity and partial civilisation has changed all that for the better; and the natives of to-day are described as mild and gentle, and little given to quarrelling. Among their customs is that of powdering the hair (always closely cropped) with lime, which is often coloured. Their huts are of dried reeds, lashed to a strong framework of poles, and have lofty arched roofs, but are without windows or chimneys. Each has two low doors, through which one must crawl. The best native huts have a partition between the dwelling and bed room, and all are carpeted with mats. The only furniture consists of one article, a short piece of wood on two small legs, used for a pillow! Clay pots are used for cooking their principal diet, yams and fish. Many of them nowadays have houses well furnished with mats, curtains, baskets, jars, &c.

Mr. Guillemard describes a tropical dinner, served to himself and companions in one of these huts. A couple of banana-leaves formed the dishes, on which boiled fish and half a dozen yams, or sweet potatoes, were offered. A large block of rock-salt was handed them to use à discretion. Then followed ripe cocoa-nuts. Dried leaves of somewhat [pg 48]tasteless wild tobacco, rolled up rapidly and neatly, and tied round with a fibre, formed the post-prandial cigars, which were lighted by the women at the fire, and passed from their lips to the guests’.

The natural productions of this group are extensive, and comprise bread-fruit, taro, cocoa-nuts, yams, bananas, plantains, guavas, oranges and lemons, wild and cultivated tobacco, sugar, cotton, and coffee. The india-rubber tree is cultivated, and among the leading exports are dried cocoa-nut and pearl-shell. As there are at the present time comparatively few white settlers—perhaps not over 2,500 in all the islands—there are innumerable openings for settlement, and Fiji, with many other neighbouring islands, will doubtless soon afford fresh examples of British enterprise.

The point touched by the steamers is Kandavu, on one of the southernmost islands, where Mount Washington, a fine mountain, rears its head 3,000 feet into the clouds. A visitor says:—“From the eastern point of land run out miles of coral reef, on which the ocean rollers are breaking grandly, and outside this barrier we take our pilot on board. The entrance to Kandavu harbour is narrow and intricate, and here the Macgregor, one of the mail steamers, struck on a submerged reef, and remained for several days hard and fast aground.” The passage has been properly buoyed and lighted, and the New Company have built offices and stores, and established a coaling station here.

“The view of Port Ugaloa from the entrance is very beautiful. On our left the coral reef encloses a still lagoon of the softest, lightest green; before us hills and mountains, covered from base to summit with the richest vegetation, are tipped with fleecy cloud; and on our right, dividing the waters of the bay, is Ugaloa Island, its slopes feathery with the foliage of the cocoa-palm and banana, half hidden in which appear here and there the low brown huts of the natives.... The brothers L. accompany me ashore on Ugaloa, landing close to a small collection of huts scattered about just above the coral-strewn beach. It is Sunday afternoon, and a native missionary is preaching to some fifty men, women, and children, squatting on their hams on the mat-covered floor of a neat, white-washed mission house. Amongst the congregation is a tall native, with a thick cane, keeping silence by tapping the heads of the inattentive. The preacher is eloquent and energetic in gesture; but Fiji is hardly a pretty language to listen to, being decidedly characterised by queer guttural sounds, and spoken very fast. The sermon over, a hymn is read out and sung to a rather monotonous dirge-like chant, and the congregation disperse. We are at once surrounded by an olive-skinned crowd; the ladies’ dresses are minutely examined, for a white lady has scarcely been seen in Kandavu before the present year. The gentlemen have to display their watches and chains, and by means of shouting and signs every one is soon carrying on a vigorous conversation. Why is it that one always elevates the voice when trying to make one’s native tongue intelligible to a foreigner?

“We wander away into the bush, and are soon lost in a wilderness of ferns, creepers, bananas, cocoa-palms, and chestnut-trees. We meet with a young native, and make signs to him that we are thirsty, and wish to refresh ourselves with the juice of a green cocoa-nut. Clutching the trunk with both hands, he almost runs up a palm, and our wants are soon plentifully supplied. He receives his douceur with apparent nonchalance, and proceeds to tie it up in a corner of his sulu with a fibre of banana bark.

“Monday morning breaks fine and clear, and our slumbers are early disturbed by the chattering of a hundred natives, a whole squadron of whose fruit-laden canoes are alongside the steamer. Queer crank-looking craft are these, roughly dug out of the trunk of a tree, and kept steady on the water by an outrigger consisting of a log half the length of the canoe, attached to it amidships by a few light poles projecting some four or five feet from its side. They are usually propelled by means of a long oar worked between the poles, after the fashion of sculling a boat from the stern; but sometimes we see the ordinary short paddle being plied at bow and stern. Some of the larger craft hoist a large long sail, but they do not seem very weatherly under canvas, which they use but little compared with the Society Islanders.

“The scene on deck is amusing enough. Forward, fifty natives, their olive skins blackened and begrimed with dust, are hard at work replenishing the coal bunkers from the hold, and thoroughly earning their shilling a day; on the poop as many more, laden with lemons, huge bunches of bananas, cocoa-nuts, shells, coral, matting, tappa—a soft, white fabric, called by the natives ‘marse’—and a few clubs and other weapons, are driving a brisk trade with the passengers. Everything is to be had for a shilling. ‘Shillin’ is the only English word that all the natives understand; in fact, this useful coin seems to be the ‘almighty dollar’ of Kandavu. You take a lemon, and ask, ‘How much?’ ‘Shillin’ is the reply; but you can obtain the man’s whole stock of sixty, basket and all, for the same money!”

Our next stopping place is one of particular interest to the British colonist. New Zealand, albeit one of the youngest, is now among the most promising of England’s outposts. Auckland, in the North Island, is the port at which the steamers touch. The harbour is very fine, and residents compare it to the Bay of Naples.

Every schoolboy knows that New Zealand includes two large and one small island, respectively known as North, Middle, and Stewart’s Island. One great feature of the coast line consists of its indentations; the colony is rich in fine natural harbours and ports. The area of the islands is nearly as great as that of Britain and Ireland combined, and about half of that area consists of excellent soil. The climate is that of England, with a difference: there are many more fine days, while winter is not so cold by half. The islands are volcanic; on the North Island, Mount Ruapahu, a perpetually snow-capped peak, rises to a height of 9,000 feet, while in the same range, the Tongariro mountain, an active volcano, rises to a height of 6,000 feet. The highest mountain range is on the Middle Island, where Mount Cook rises to a height of 14,000 feet. One can understand that in such a country there should be an abundance of evergreen forests of luxuriant growth. These are interspersed with charming fern-clad slopes and treeless grassy plains. Water is everywhere found; but none of the rivers are navigable by large vessels for more than fifty miles or so. One great advantage found in the country is the absence of noxious reptiles or insects: of the latter there is not one as offensive as an English wasp. The pigs, introduced by Captain Cook, run wild over the island, and there is plenty of large and small game: the red and fallow deer, the pheasant, partridge, and quail. Everything that grows in England will thrive there, while the vine, maize, taro, and sweet potato grow in many districts. A traveller[21] says of the (Thames) gold fields:—“Mines here, like everywhere else, are now dull. At one time there [pg 51]was a population of 22,000, but now this is only 13,000. Everybody one sees seems to have lost in the gold-diggings, and it is a mystery to me who is the lucky person that wins—one never seems to meet him.” This somewhat random statement may be taken cum grano salis, as the gold-fields have yielded largely at times. Nevertheless, mining is always more or less a lottery.

Mr. Anthony Trollope testifies to the intense British feeling in New Zealand, where he felt thoroughly at home. Australia he found tinged with a form of boasting Yankeeism. “The New Zealander,” says he,[22] “among John Bulls is the most John Bullish. He admits the supremacy of England to every place in the world, only he is more English than any Englishman at home.”

Discovered by Tasman in 1642, England only commenced to take an interest in the islands more than a century and a quarter later, when Cook surveyed the coasts. The missionaries came first, in 1814, and a British Resident was appointed in 1833. All this time a desultory colonisation was going on, and the natives were selling parcels of their best lands for a few cast-iron hatchets or muskets, shoddy blankets, or rubbishy trinkets. In 1840 a Lieutenant-Governor was appointed from home, and his presence was indeed necessary. The previous year a corporation, calling itself the New Zealand Company, had made pretended purchases of tracts of the best parts of the country, amounting to one-third of its whole area! The unscrupulous and defiant manner in which this company treated the natives and the Government brought about many complications, and led to very serious wars with natives not to be trifled with. The New Zealand Company was “bought out” by the Government in 1852 for £268,000. During 1843-7, and in 1861 and after, England had to fight the Maories—foes that she learned to respect. At last, weary of war, all our troops were withdrawn, and the colonists, who of course knew the bush and bush life better than nine-tenths of the soldiers, were left to defend their homes and property, and in the end to successfully finish the fight. The natives now are generally peaceful and subdued, while many are even turning their attention to agriculture and commerce. Nine years ago they numbered 37,500, but are fast dying out.

Physically and intellectually, the Maories are the finest semi-savage natives on the face of the earth. Mr. Trollope is an author and traveller whose words carry weight, and he has given us the following concise summary of their qualities and character:—“They are,” says he, “an active people, the men averaging 5 feet 6½ inches in height, and are almost equal in strength and weight to Englishmen. In their former condition they wore matting; now they wear European clothes. Formerly they pulled out their beards, and every New Zealander of mark was tattooed; now they wear beards, and the young men are not tattooed. Their hair is black and coarse, but not woolly like a negro’s, or black like a Hindoo’s. The nose is almost always broad and the mouth large. In other respects their features are not unlike those of the European race. The men, to my eyes, were better-looking than the women, and the men who were tattooed better-looking than those who had dropped the custom. The women still retain the old custom of tattooing the upper lip. The Maories had a mythology of their own, and believed in a future existence; but they did not recognise [pg 52]one supreme God. Virtue with them, as with other savages, consisted chiefly in courage and a command of temper. Their great passion was revenge, which was carried on by one tribe against another to the extent sometimes of the annihilation of tribes. The decrease of their population since the English first came among them has been owing as much to civil war as to the injuries with which civilisation has afflicted them. They seem from early days to have acquired that habit of fighting behind stockades or in fortified pahs which we have found so fatal to ourselves in our wars with them. Their weapons, before they got guns from us, were not very deadly. They were chiefly short javelins and stones, both flung from slings. But there was a horror in their warfare to the awfulness of which they themselves seem to have been keenly alive. When a prisoner was taken in war he was cooked and eaten.

“I do not think that human beings were slaughtered for food in New Zealand, although there is no doubt that the banquet when prepared was enjoyed with a horrid relish.

“I will quote a passage from Dr. Thompson’s work in reference to the practice of cannibalism, and will then have done with the subject. ‘Whether or not cannibalism commenced immediately after the advent of the New Zealanders from Hawaiki, it is nevertheless certain that one of Tasman’s sailors was eaten in 1642; that Captain Cook had a boat’s crew eaten in 1774; that Marion de Fresne and many other navigators met this horrible end; and that the pioneers of civilisation and successive missionaries have all borne testimony to the universal prevalence of cannibalism in New Zealand up to the year 1840. It is impossible to state how many New Zealanders were annually devoured; that the number was not small may be inferred from two facts authenticated by European witnesses. In 1822, Hougi’s army ate three hundred persons after the capture of Totara, on the River Thames, and in 1836, during the Rotura war, sixty beings were cooked and eaten in two days.’ I will add from the same book a translation of a portion of a war-song:—‘Oh, my little son, are you crying? are you screaming for your food? Here it is for you, the flesh of Hekemanu and Werata. Although I am surfeited with the soft brains of Putu Rikiriki and Raukauri, yet such is my hatred that I will fill myself fuller with those of Pau, of Ngaraunga, of Pipi, and with my most dainty morsel, the flesh of the hated Teao.’ ”

Mr. Laird testifies to their cleanliness, but states that they are, like most savages, and for that matter, most white men, very improvident. If a bad potato or other crop occurred, they would eat it all at once, and half starve afterwards.

The same author tells a good story of the nonchalance of a leading Maori chief who was invited to dinner at Government House during the visit of H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh. After dinner the Duke’s chief bagpiper came in and played. The chief was asked how he liked the music. He replied briefly: “Too much noise for me; but suit white man well enough.”

And now we are approaching that great continent which has had, has, and will increasingly have, so much interest for the emigrant, who must be, more or less, a voyager and man of the sea. Australia, a country nearly as large as the United States, must be for many a day to come a very Paradise for the poor man.

The American steamers from San Francisco land one at Sydney, of which charming place Mr. Trollope says:—“I despair of being able to convey to my readers my own idea of the beauty of Sydney Harbour;” he considers that it excels Dublin Bay, Spezzia, and [pg 53]New York. And the colonists, left to themselves—for England maintains no troops there now—have fortified it strongly. Mr. Trollope tells us of five separate armed fortresses, with Armstrong guns, rifled guns, guns of eighteen tons’ weight, with loopholed walls and pits for riflemen, as though Sydney was to become another Sebastopol. “It was shown,” says he, “how the whole harbour and city were commanded by these guns. There were open batteries and casemated batteries, shell-rooms and gunpowder magazines, [pg 54]barracks rising here and trenches dug there. There was a boom to be placed across the harbour, and a whole world of torpedoes ready to be sunk beneath the water, all of which were prepared and ready for use in an hour or two. It was explained to me that ‘they’ could not possibly get across the trenches, or break the boom, or escape the torpedoes, or live for an hour beneath the blaze of the guns. ‘They’ would not have a chance to get at Sydney. There was much martial ardour, and a very general opinion that ‘they’ would have the worst of it.” New South Wales and Victoria have about 8,000 volunteers and a training-ship for sailor boys; while an enormous monitor, the Cerberus, presented by the mother country, forms its war-fleet of one.

VIEW IN COLLINS STREET, MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA.

Of Melbourne, Victoria, mention has already been made. There are many cities with larger populations, but few have ever attained so great a size with such rapidity. Though it owes nothing to natural surroundings, “the internal appearance of the city is,” Mr. Trollope assures us, “certainly magnificent.” It is built on the Philadelphian rectangular plan; it is the width of the streets which give the city a fine appearance, together with the devotion of large spaces within the limits for public gardens. “One cannot walk about Melbourne without being struck by all that has been done for the welfare of the people generally. There is no squalor to be seen—though there are quarters of the town in which the people no doubt are squalid.... But he who would see such misery in Melbourne must search for it specially.” There are no workhouses; their place is supplied in the colony of Victoria generally by “Benevolent Asylums.” In Melbourne about 12,000 poor are relieved yearly, some using the institution there as a temporary, and others as a permanent place of refuge. These places are chiefly, but not entirely, supported by Government aid. “Could a pauper,” says Trollope, “be suddenly removed out of an English union workhouse into the Melbourne Benevolent Asylum, he might probably think that he had migrated to Buckingham Palace,” so well are the inmates fed and cared for. There are no workhouses proper in any part of Australia, and the charity bestowed on these asylums is not given painfully or sparingly.

The wideness of the streets, however, and grandeur of general dimensions, have their drawbacks, among which the time consumed in reaching distant parts of the city counts first. Melbourne has a fine and entirely free Public Library and a University, as, indeed, has Sydney. Melbourne is the centre of a system of railways, and the well-to-do people all live out of town; in the south and east of the city there are miles of villas and mansions.

Mr. Trollope says:—“There is perhaps no town in the world in which an ordinary working man can do better for himself and for his family with his work than he can at Melbourne.” The rates of wages for mechanics are slightly greater than at home, and all the necessaries of life are cheaper. With meat at 4d. per pound, butter from 6d. upwards, bread, tea, and coffee about the same prices or rather under, coals the same or a trifle higher, potatoes, vegetables, and fruits generally considerably cheaper, all can live well and plentifully. Meat three times a day is common all over Australia, and in some parts the price is as low as 1½d. or 2d. per pound. Wages for good mechanics and artisans average about 10s. a day; gardeners receive about 50s., and labourers about 30s. per week; men-servants, in the house, £40 to £50 per annum; cooks, £35 to £45 per year; girls, as housemaids, &c., 8s. or 10s. per week. It is usual to hire the last named by this [pg 55]short term. Some of these prices rule all over the country, but are liable to rule lower, rather than higher, outside of Melbourne.

In the country sheep-shearers can earn 7s. to 14s. per day for about four months in the year; shepherds, £30 to £40 per year, with rations. The common labourer can count on 15s. to 20s. per week, with rations: these consist generally of 14 lbs. meat (usually mutton), 8 lbs. flour, 2 lbs. sugar, and a quarter of a pound of tea. Of course, where fruit or vegetables are plentiful they would be added. The meat, bread, and tea diet, however, is that characteristic of the whole country. In the great sheep runs and cattle ranges[23] it would be the shepherd’s diet invariably.

Mr. Trollope advises the poor man to save for three or four years, and then invest in land, which in some places is to be had at 3s. 9d. an acre, payable to the Government in five instalments of ninepence per acre. Of course, he would require money for the erection of a house, farm implements, &c. The great trouble with most men working in the bush as shepherds or shearers, or at the mines, or elsewhere at distant points, is that the enforced absence from civilisation and social life makes them inclined for reckless living when they have accumulated a sum of money. The tavern-keepers of the nearest town or station reap all the benefit, and there are numbers of men who, for ten or eleven months of the year perfectly steady and sober, periodically give themselves up to drink until their earnings are melted, it is called “knocking down” one’s cheque, and it is a common practice for them to hand such cheque to the publican, who lets them run on recklessly in drink and food until he considers it exhausted. A good story is told by Mr. Trollope of a man who had been accustomed to do this at regular intervals, but who on one occasion, having some loose silver, “planted” his cheque in an old tree, and proceeded to the usual haunt, where he set to work deliberately to get drunk. The publican showed evident doubt as to the propriety of supplying him freely. Why had not the man brought his cheque as usual? The tavern-keeper at last put him to bed; but the man, though drugged and stupefied, had his wits about him sufficiently to observe and remember that the host had examined his clothes, his hat, and boots, for the lacking cheque. Next morning he was ignominiously expelled from the house, but he didn’t mind: the cheque was found by him safely in the tree by the roadside, and he surprised his master by returning to the station a week or two before he was expected richer than he had ever come home before. Let us hope he was cured of that form of folly for ever.

The gold yield of Australia for the twenty years between 1851 and 1871 was 50,750,000 ozs. But gold-fields die out sooner than most mines, and Australia has a more permanent source of prosperity for the future in its coal and iron-fields, which are in close proximity to each other. The coal is already worked to great profit, and is one of the principal steamship fuels of the Pacific.

The steamship route homeward from Australia is that by the Indian Ocean (usually touching at Ceylon), then reaching the Mediterranean viâ the Red Sea and Suez Canal. These points of interest have already been fully described in early chapters of this work.

[pg 56]

CHAPTER V.

Woman at Sea.

Poets’ Opinions on Early Navigation—Who was the First Female Navigator?—Noah’s Voyage—A Thrilling Tale—A Strained Vessel—A Furious Gale—A Birth at Sea—The Ship Doomed—Ladies and Children in an Open Boat—Drunken Sailors—Semi-starvation, Cold, and Wet—Exposed to the Tropical Sun—Death of a Poor Baby—Sharks about—A Thievish Sailor—Proposed Cannibalism—A Sail!—The Ship passes by—Despair—Saved at Last—Experiences of a Yachtswoman—Nearly Swamped and Carried Away—An Abandoned Ship—The Sunbeam of Service—Ship on Fire!—Dangers of a Coal Cargo—The Crew Taken off—Noble Lady Passengers—Two Modern Heroines and their Deeds—The Story of Grace Darling—The Longstone Light and Wreck of the Forfarshire—To the Rescue!—Death of Grace Darling.

“Hearts sure of brass they had who tempted first

Rude seas that spare not what themselves have nursed.”

So sings Waller, and his words are only the repetition of a sentiment much more grandly expressed by Horace, who wrote now near two thousand years ago:—“Surely oak and threefold brass surrounded his heart who first trusted a frail vessel to the merciless ocean.” And once more, just to show the unanimity of the poets on this point, Dr. Watts has said:—

“It was a brave attempt! advent’rous he

Who in the first ship broke the unknown sea.”

Now, if all this is said of man, what shall be said of the woman who first trusted herself on the great deep? Who was she? It would be most difficult to satisfactorily answer this question, but there can be no doubt that “Noah’s wife, and the three wives of his sons,” whose voyage and enforced residence in the ark lasted no less than twelve months and three days[24] are the earliest females on record who embarked in a great vessel on a boundless expanse of waters.

These pages have already presented episodes in the lives of many seafaring ladies, but till now no chapter has been specially devoted to the subject. In these days of general travel ladies make, as we have often seen, long voyages to and from far distant parts. One of them, some nineteen years ago, underwent the horrors of shipwreck, and her subsequent sufferings were admirably told by her under the title of “Ten Terrible Days.” The account, which should be read in its entirety, is here, for obvious reasons, considerably condensed.

One day late in the year 1861 a grain-laden vessel, a fine clipper, might have been seen slowly and gracefully sailing out of the noble bay of San Francisco. On her as passengers were two or three ladies with children, among them Mrs. William Murray, the authoress, who had been recommended to take the long voyage home in a roving clipper, in preference to taking a passage in the over-crowded steamers running to Panama and New York. Let her open the story. “The sun,” says she, “was shining as it always does in California, [pg 57]until the sea and the rocks and the vast city seemed literally glittering with sunlight. One long look back to the happy home of the last six years, to the home still of the husband and brothers obliged to remain behind, and at last I had only the sea that parted us to look at through my tears. Our friends had seen us set sail in what seemed a gallant ship. It had been chosen from all others as the one to send us home in for its show of perfectness. There were men in San Francisco who knew that the ship was unseaworthy (having been frightfully strained in her last voyage to China), and that she was in no fit condition to be trusted with the lives of helpless women and children, yet they let us sail without a word of warning.”

The dreaded Horn had been easily rounded in good weather, and on the evening of January 4th, 1862, they had been eighty-six days out; in ten more they expected to be in England. The sailors had predicted a stormy night, and a terrific gale followed closely on that prophecy. The wind increased in fury, and the ship rolled till those on board were often thrown from their feet. That night a child was born on board, and the kindly lady passengers did all in their power for the poor mother.

“At dawn,” says Mrs. Murray, “taking my little girl by the hand, I went on deck. The storm had in some measure abated, but the sea looked black and sullen, and the swell of the vast heavy waves seemed to mock our frailty. The sailors had been up all night, and were [pg 58]as men playing at some ferocious game: some working in desperation at the pumps, and singing at the pitch of their voices wild sea-songs to time their common efforts; others employed in throwing hundreds of bags of grain into the sea, that they might thus lighten the ship. This, I think, more than all, showed me our peril. I wandered about, too miserable to remain in any one spot, till the captain assembled us all once more in the cabin to get some food, saying that it was impossible to save the ship, and that we should have need of all our fortitude. I remembered my own vain attempt to eat some bread, but the poor little children took their breakfast and enjoyed it.

“We were then each provided with a large bag made of sailcloth, and were advised by the captain to fill it with the warmest articles of clothing we possessed.

“All my worldly possessions were on board, comprising many memorials of dear friends, portraits of loved ones I shall never see again, and my money loss I knew would be no trifle. In perfect bewilderment I looked round, and filled my bag with stockings and a couple of warm shawls. On the top of a box I saw a little parcel that had been entrusted to me by a lady in California to deliver to her mother in Liverpool. I put that in my bag, and she got it.... There had been no thought of removing the breakfast, and with the rolling of the ship, which was every moment becoming worse, everything had fallen on the floor, and was dashing about in all directions. Boxes, water-jugs, plates, dishes, chairs, glasses, were pitching from one end of the saloon to the other. Children screaming, sailors shouting and cursing, and loud above all there was the creaking of timbers, and the sullen sound of water fast gaining upon us in the hold of the ship, which groaned and laboured like a living thing in agony.”

How the ridiculous will intrude even at such times is shown in the following. A little boy was discovered helping himself out of the medicine-chest, particularly busy with the contents of a broken calomel bottle! Lamp-oil served as an emetic in this emergency, and the youngster’s life was saved. And now the first mate, upon whose decision and firmness much depended, having lost his presence of mind, had drunk deeply of whisky. He was intoxicated, and so, too, were many of the sailors, who had followed his example. The captain, meantime, had been busily employed in ordering out food and water to supply the boats, collecting the ship’s papers, &c. The lowering of the boats he had entrusted to his officers. On hearing of the drunkenness on deck, his first thought was to get the women and children off at once, for should the sailors seize the boats, what would become of them? Two boats had already been smashed whilst lowering them into the sea, and there were only two remaining. Forty-seven people to cram into two frail boats, fifteen hundred miles from land: delicately-nurtured women, helpless children, drunken and desperate men.

“THE PASSENGERS WERE LET DOWN BY ROPES” (p. 58).

By the help of the most sober of the sailors, the captain’s own boat was lowered; some small mattresses, pillows, blankets, a cask of water, sacks of biscuit, and nautical instruments, were first put in; then the passengers were let down by ropes. “It seems marvellous,” says Mrs. Murray, “when I think of it now, that in our descent we were not dashed to pieces against the ship’s side. We had to wait for each descent a favourable moment while she was leaning over. Then the word of command was given, and we were slung down like sheep. My heart stood still whilst my little one was going down, and then I followed. It was a terrible sight for a woman to see that poor creature whose baby was born the night before, looking like a corpse in a long dressing-gown of white [pg 59]flannel, with the poor little atom of mortality tightly clasped in her arms. I thought she would die before the day was over.”

At last they were all in the boat: four women, five children, the second mate, and sixteen sailors. The captain stayed on the ship, providing for the safety of the drunken creatures who could not take care of themselves, and then he came off. How small the boat looked by the side of the tall ship! And they had to get quickly out of her reach, for she was rolling so heavily that the waters near her boiled up like a maelström.

Away they drifted, a mere speck upon the ocean. Before night there came a storm of thunder, lightning, wind, and rain, that lasted through the darkness, and by which they were drenched through and through. “I sat up,” says the narrator, “for some twelve or fourteen hours on a narrow plank, with my child in my arms, utterly miserable, cold, and hopeless, soaked to the skin, blinded by the salt spray, my face and hands smarting intolerably with the unusual exposure.”

During the storm and confusion the greater part of their biscuit had been soaked with salt water, and made useless. It was also discovered that the food collected for the captain’s boat had been thrown by mistake into the other, therefore it was necessary at once to put them on allowance: half a pint of water and half a biscuit a day to each person. Except the biscuit, there were only a few small tins of preserved strawberries and Indian corn, and these were given to the ladies. “How the poor children cried with hunger as the days dragged on!”