otype in
broad daylight. So I will now say good-bye, hoping you will set down all
deficiencies and incoherences in this long dispatch to the new and
delightful feelings such a place and such a new pleasure have produced
in our wondering heads. But in Gibraltar as at home, you must believe me
ever, dearest mamma, your dutiful and affectionate daughter, and dearest
sisters, your loving and affectionate sister,

"SYBIL."

My eldest son's letter to his grandpapa was as follows:

"DEAR GRANDPAPA,

"I like the sea quite as well as I expected; but I would rather go out
shooting at home. I hope mamma, however, will allow us to go to the Cape
or Canada. Smart says he should like to shoot a bear, and I wish to kill
an elephant. In the Bay of Biscay we had a rolling sea. The captain told
us the waves were 30 feet high; the wind was very great, and blew from
the South-West; but the captain did not seem afraid, he laughed and
liked it, so I thought it better not to be afraid either. But Smart was
very ill, and said, whenever we spoke to him, 'Oh! I wish I was at home
with my old woman.' Felix told him he was a coward and afraid; but he
said, 'I ain't afeard, but I be going to die, I be sure.' The dogs are
very happy and so is the cow; we feed her every day, and she knows us
quite well; she has not been sea-sick, or the dogs, or Felix and I, or
the captain and sailors, but I think everybody else has. Pray give my
love to grandmamma and my aunts. I am tired of this long letter, and I
think you will be also. I remain, your dutiful and affectionate
grandson,

"OSCAR."

Gatty's letter was to her sister:--

"MY DEAREST LIFFY,

"This is such glorious fun; but I am so hot. I declare if I stay here
much longer I shall flow away, and nothing be left of me but a rivulet.
I eat oranges all day long. We have a basket full put by our bedsides at
night, and I never leave one by breakfast time if I can help it. It is a
horrid nuisance being so sick at sea. I really thought in the Bay of
Biscay that I should make a fool of myself and wish I was at home again.
I don't like this place much, one is so stewed; there is not a shadow,
all seems baked hard as pie-crust twice done. I like being on the sea
better now I have got over being ill; there is a breeze to cool one,
besides it is so jolly having nothing to do but watch the