truth nearly enough for poetical consistency, but their judgment is
hopelessly perverted, and their imagination is too luxuriantly vivid
for a truthful realistic delineation of sea life. Byron's _London
Packet_ is a brilliant exception, but I remember no other in the whole
range of poetical literature.

Our life since we left port has certainly been anything but poetical.

For nearly a week, we suffered all the indescribable miseries of
seasickness, without any alleviating circumstances whatever. Day after
day we lay in our narrow berths, too sick to read, too unhappy to
talk, watching the cabin lamp as it swung uneasily in its well-oiled
gimbals, and listening to the gurgle and swash of the water around the
after dead-lights, and the regular clank, clank of the blocks of the
try-sail sheet as the rolling of the vessel swung the heavy boom from
side to side.

We all professed to be enthusiastic supporters of the Tapleyan
philosophy--jollity under all circumstances; but we failed most
lamentably in reconciling our practice with our principles. There was
not the faintest suggestion of jollity in the appearance of the four
motionless, prostrate figures against the wall. Seasickness had
triumphed over philosophy! Prospective and retrospective reverie of
a decidedly gloomy character was our only occupation. I remember
speculating curiously upon the probability of Noah's having ever
been seasick; wondering how the sea-going qualities of the Ark would
compare with those of our brig, and whether she had our brig's
uncomfortable way of pitching about in a heavy swell.

If she had--and I almost smiled at the idea--what an unhappy
experience it must have been for the poor animals!

I wondered also if Jason and Ulysses were born with sea-legs, or
whether they had to go through the same unpleasant process that we did
to get them on.

Concluded finally that sea-legs, like some diseases must be a
diabolical invention of modern times, and that the ancients got along
in some way without them. Then, looking intently at the fly-specks
upon the painted boards ten inches from my eyes, I would recall all
the bright anticipations with which I had sailed from San Francisco,
and turn over, with a groan of disgust, to the wall.

I wonder if any one has ever written down on paper his seasick
reveries. There are "Evening Reveries," "Reveries of a Bachelor," and
"Seaside Reveries" in abundance; but no one, so far as I know, has
ever even a