ON THE EDGE OF THE GULF-STREAM.
FRIDAY MORNING, _June 17, 1859_. Here we are on the edge of the
Gulf-Stream, loitering in a fog that would seem to drape the whole
Atlantic in its chilly, dismal shroud. We are as impatient as children
before the drop-curtain of a country show, and in momentary expectation
that this unlucky mist will rise and exhibit Halifax, where we leave the
steamer, and take a small coasting-vessel for Cape Breton and
Newfoundland.
As we anticipated, both of us have been sea-sick continually. I had
hoped that we should have the pleasure of one dinner at least, with that
good appetite so common upon coming off into the salt air. But before
the soup was fairly off there came over me the old qualm, the herald of
those dreadful impulses that drive the unhappy victim either to the side
of the vessel, or down into its interior, where he lays himself out,
pale and trembling, on his appointed shelf, and awaits in gloomy silence
the final issue. It is needless to record, that, with that unlucky
attempt to enjoy the luxuries of the table, perished, not only the
power, but the wish to eat.
Yesterday, when I came on deck, I found C—— conversing with Agassiz.
Although so familiar with the Alpine glaciers, and all that appertains
to them, he had never seen an iceberg, and almost envied us the delight
and excitement of hunting them. But not even the presence and the fine
talk of the great naturalist could lay the spirit of sea-sickness. Like
a very adder lurking under the doorstone of appetite, it refused to hear
the voice of the charmer. Out it glided, repulsive reptile! and away we
stole, creeping down into our state-room, there to burrow in damp
sheets, taciturn and melancholy “wretches, with thoughts concentred all
in self.” An occasional remark, either sad or laughable, broke the
sameness of the literally rolling hours. By what particular process of
mind, I shall not trouble myself to explain, the Painter, who occupied
the lower berth, all at once gave signs that he had come upon the
borders of a capital story, and with the spirit to carry even a dull
listener to the further side of it, and keep him thoroughly amused. It
was a traveller’s tale, a story of his own first ride over the mountains
of New Granada, accompanied by a friend, on his way to the Andes.