e afternoon, but we
toiled on; and the sun at last went down, and we found ourselves with
the steeple of Strasburg a long way off. We again anchored, and had to
pass another night in this miserable vessel and delightful company. The
detention, of course, made our fellow-passengers more cross; and could I
have obtained possession of the cowskin, I would certainly have thrown
it overboard. The captain sent a man on shore to procure us something
to eat, for the steward declared himself bankrupt. The next forenoon we
arrived at the bridge of boats between Kehl and Strasburg; and thus was
finished our tedious and unpleasant voyage, of which I have given a
description as a warning to all future travellers. Our
fellow-passengers did once condescend to address and inform us that they
had left England (a party of ten people) only to pay a visit to some
friends in Switzerland--an expensive sort of trip, and which did not
appear at all consistent with the fact that they were travelling without
a carriage or female servants. Be it as it might, we separated without
so much as a salutation or good-bye being exchanged.

Much of the picturesque on the Rhine is destroyed by the vineyards,
which are, in reality, the most unpoetical things in landscape scenery,
being ranged up the sides of the mountains in little battalions like
infantry. It is remarkable in how shallow and how very poor a soil the
vine will grow. At Saint Michael's, they dig square holes in the
volcanic rocks, and the vines find sustenance. At the Cape of Good Hope
the Constantia vineyards are planted upon little more than sand. I dug
down some depth; and could find nothing else. The finest grapes grown
in Burgundy are upon a stratum of soil little more than a foot deep,
over schistus slate quarries, and the soil itself composed chiefly of
the _debris_ of this soft rock.

We know that the vegetable creation has a sort of instinct as well as
the animal and it appears to me that there are different degrees of
instinct in that portion of nature as well as in the other. A vine, for
instance, I take to be a very clever plant, and both apple and
pear-trees to be great fools. The vine will always seek its own
nourishment, hunting with its roots through the soil for the aliment it
requires; and if it cannot find it where it is planted, it will seek, in
every direction and to a great distance, to obtain it. It is asserted
that the famous vine at Hampton Court has p