tossed about on a troubled sea indeed;
for a strong wind was blowing from E.S.E. However, at eight o'clock,
just before breakfast, we sounded in thirty-five fathoms. We had
scarcely concluded this cautious operation before the wind began to
lull; and after conjecturing, both from our calculations and soundings,
that land was not far away, we were confirmed in this opinion by a thick
fog rising above the horizon on our lee beam. We went to dinner in great
glee, and, in spite of the hazy atmosphere which now surrounded us,
compensation was felt and accepted by us at the hour of six, when a
perfect calm prevailed; and our peasoup and curry were threatened, for
the first time this week, to be demolished in that gentlemanly and
collected mode which the usages of society had rendered familiar to our
observation in England.

At eleven o'clock at night the haziness cleared away, and in about half
an hour afterwards a light was seen. It was imagined to be the light at
the mouth of the Christiansand Fiord, the name of which, amidst the
bustle and joyousness of the moment, I could but indistinctly learn, and
cannot now remember. As midnight approached, our old friend the fog
gathered density, and effectually deprived us of the slightest glimpse
of the light; and we retired to rest ill at ease, plunged into the vale
of anxiety in the same ratio as we had been exalted on the peaks of
expectation and joy.

Sunday at sea retains all the monotony of the shore; for the waves seem
to show deference to the day, and move their crests with more solemnity
and order; while the sailors gather round the vessel's bows, and, in a
group, listen with wrapt attention to the sublime and poetic sentences
of prophetic Isaiah.

I cannot, in all my wanderings at sea, call to mind a tempestuous
Sabbath, nor the sailors who would profane it. Mark them! How solemnly
the shadow of thought hangs over their countenances; and how, with cheek
cradled on the hand, with pipes unsmoked in their mouths, leaning over
the bulwarks, their eyes intently riveted on the clear distant horizon,
as, carried away by the inspiration and fervour of the great prophet, a
messmate, who reads with energy of gesture, ever and anon raises his
voice, which, by its tremulous intonation, tells the deep feeling of his
heart, and the quickness with which its pulse vibrates in answer to the
burning words he utters aloud!

Monday, the 10th, the most lovely of May mornings, fanned by th