hat one was in a well-stocked farm-yard; but on opening them
again, one found one's self surrounded by objects of a very different
character, to what one would there have seen. Instead of the trees,
there were the tall masts, the rigging, and sails above one's head, the
bulwarks instead of the walls of the barns, the black and white seamen
with thick beards instead of the ploughmen and milk-maids, and the wide
glittering ocean instead of the muddy horse-pond.

This was the scene on the upper deck: below, it was stranger still.
There were two decks, one beneath the other, both with occupants; there
were cooks at the galley fire, whose complexion no soot could make
blacker, and servants in white dresses and embroidered shawls, running
backwards and forwards with their masters' tiffins, as luncheons are
called in India.

There were numerous cabins, many occupied by persons whose sole
employment was to kill time, forgetting how soon time would kill them in
return, and they would have to sum up the account of how they had spent
their days on earth.

In the lower deck there were soldiers with their wives and children, and
seamen, some sleeping out their watch below, and others mending their
clothes, while a few were reading--a very few, I fear, such books as
were calculated to afford them much instruction. Below, again, in the
dark recesses of the hold, there were seamen with lanterns getting up
stores and provisions of various sorts. In one place were seen three
men--it was the gunner and his two mates. They had carefully-closed
lanterns and list shoes on their feet. They were visiting the magazine,
to see that the powder was dry. They were from habit careful, but
custom had made them thoughtless of danger; yet one spark from the
lantern would in a moment have sent every one of the many hundred living
beings on board that ship into eternity. The flannel bags containing
the powder were removed to be carried up on deck to dry, the door was
carefully closed and locked, and the gunner and his mates went about
their other avocations.

From long habit, people are apt to forget the dangers which surround
them, though they are far greater than those in which the passengers of
the good ship _Governor Harcourt_ were placed at the moment the magazine
was opened; and I am very certain that not one of them contemplated the
possibility of being blown up, without an instant warning, into the air.

I have indulged in a somewhat