The Norvicensian (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1880 Excerpt: ...his foam fountains in the sea" for our delectation; while the nautilus, the jelly-fish, the Portuguese man-of-war, should have strewed the surface. But having traversed rather more than six thousand miles, and seen little or none of all these, I feel as if I am in a position to assert that the books are frauds, and that the authors cram the experiences of a life-time into the space of a single voyage, and draw on their imagination besides. Two or three shoals of porpoises, and those in the last ten days of the voyage, a few Mother Carey's chickens, boobies, Cape pigeons, and what the sailors call molly-hawks, a sort of small albatross about the size of the black-backed gull, a lot of seals in the mouth of the River Plate, and two Portuguese men-of-war, constituted, with any number of flying-fish of course, the whole amount of animal life we saw during the voyage. Cooler consideration, however, leads to the conclusion that the books are written about sailing voyages, and that a steamer going a steady ten or twelve knots is not likely to be surrounded and followed by sea-beasts, as is a ship which may often not exceed four knots for days together, and sometimes make no way at all. Our only stop, as I have said, was at St. Vincent, and there we were anchored for twelve hours taking in coal; so, mainly to see the place, and partly to avoid the coal dust, we went ashore. Seeing the placo was soon done, and what a place it is If the reader can imagine a cinder heap some ten miles long, five broad, and about 1500 feet high, without one sign of verdure except a few wretched tamarisks, then he can form an exact picture of the island of St. Vincent. A little town straggles along the beach, occupied entirely by people who are engaged in the one business to which...