sked Howells for a few letters of
introduction to English authors.

He surprised me by saying, "I have very few acquaintances in England but
I will do what I can for you."

At the moment of embarkation I disappointed myself by remaining quite
calm. Even when the great ship began to heave and snort and slide away
from the wharf I experienced no thrill--it was not till an hour or two
later, as I stood on the forward deck, watching the sun go down over the
tumbling spread of water, which had something of the majesty I had known
in the prairies, that I became exalted. The vast expanse seemed
strangely like an appalling desert and lifting my eyes to the cloudy
horizon line I could almost imagine myself back on the rocks of Walpi
overlooking the Navajo reservation.

In a letter to my mother I gave the story of my trip. "Feeling a bit
queer along about nine o'clock I went to my state room.--When I came on
deck the next time, my eyes rested upon the green hills of Ireland!--I
am certain the ship's restaurant realized the highest possible profit in
my case for I remember but two meals, one as we were leaving Sandy Hook,
the other as we signaled Queenstown. It may be that I imbibed a bowl of
soup in the interim,--I certainly swallowed a great many doses of
several kinds of medicine. The ship's doctor declared me to be the
worst sailor he had even known in all his thirty years' experience,--so
much of distinction I may definitely claim."

In the dark hours of that interminable week, I went over my trail into
the Skeena Valley during the previous May, with retrospective delight.
In contrast to these endless days of lonely misery in my ship bed those
weeks of rain and mud and mosquitoes became a joyous outing. So far from
giving any thought to problems of dress or social intercourse I was only
interested in reaching land--any land.

"In two minutes after I landed at Liverpool I was perfectly well," I
wrote to my mother. "The touch of solid earth under my feet instantly
restored my sanity. My desire to live returned. In an hour I was aboard
one of the quaint little coaches of the Midland Express and on my way to
London.

"Lush meadows, flecked with fat red cattle feeding beside slow streams;
broad lawns rising to wooded hills, on which many-towered gray buildings
rose; sudden thick-walled towns; factories, winding streams, noble
trees, and finally a yellow mist and London!

"I am at a small inn, near the Terminal Hotel. I ate