Short Studies on Great Subjects (Volume 1) (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: SEA STUDIES. To a man of middle age whose occupations have long confined him to the unexhilarating atmosphere of a library, there is something unspeakably delightful in a sea voyage. Increasing years, if they bring little else that is agreeable with them, bring to some of us immunity from sea-sickness. The regularity of habit on board a ship, the absence of dinner parties, the exchange of the table in the close room for the open deck under an awning, and the ever-blowing breeze which the motion of the vessel forbids to sink into a calm, give vigour to the tired system, restore the conscious enjoyment of elastic health, and even mock us for the moment with the belief that age is an illusion, and that the wild freshness of the morning of life has not yet passed away for ever. Above our heads is the arch of the sky, around us the ocean, rolling free and fresh as it rolled a million years ago, and our spirits catch a contagion from the elements. Our step on the boards recovers its buoyancy. We are rocked to rest at night by a gentle movement which soothes us into a dreamless sleep of childhood, and we wake with the certainty that we are beyond the reach of the postman. We are shut off, as in a Catholic retreat, from the worries and anxieties of the world. No Times upon the breakfast-table calls our thoughts tothe last news from Paris or St. Petersburg, or the vehemently-expressed nothings of last night's debate in Parliament. Once, indeed, when I was crossing the Atlantic in a Cunard Steamer, the steward entered the saloon with a pile of fresh damp sheets under his arm. Has it come to this ? I said to myself. Has Yankee enterprise invaded even the ocean, and robbed us even of our ten days' respite from the leading article and the latest intelligence? But the steward was but...