ting city. They seemed
noteworthy then, but to-day, and to make a long voyage short, I will
only say that it's an ill wind that can't leave off blowing, and it's a
long water-course that has no landing-stage, and that consequently,
after a good deal of boisterous weather, the sea calmed down and we
arrived safely in New York harbour. On the morning when the pilot came
on board, we were most of us still in our berths; but Ellen was up and
on deck, and the first to shake hands with him, and greet him with a
hearty "Good-morning, Mr. Pilot!"

The first thing that happened to me on arriving in the free country,
was that I was most courteously but resolutely deprived of my liberty by
the interviewers. Hobnobbing as I was with Irving and Ellen Terry, they
had evidently taken me for somebody, and, under that mistaken
impression, at once proceeded to extract copy from me.

What a splendid institution that interviewing is! The stranger has from
the first a unique opportunity of showing himself just as he wishes to
appear. He can drape himself in dignity, or pose for the free and easy;
he can borrow good works from his friends and virtues from good books,
and throw in as much soft-soap and blarney as he thinks the natives can
stand. What I may have said I don't know; but I am quite sure I missed
my chance. I was much too innocent then, and probably told the truth.

On Ellen the interviewers must have doted from the first; she was so
charmingly impulsive, so spontaneous and overflowing with copy. I dare
say she gave them points about Art and the Drama, from Sophocles _via_
Shakespeare down to the last thing out; but I only remember the
delightful insight into her personal habits and tastes she let them have
when she chose to take the world into her confidence.

"What do I drink?" she said on one occasion. "Very little wine, I am so
nervous. The doctor restricts me to milk, but restrictions and doctors
combined will never come between me and my tea. I must have tea--tea or
death--three times a day, and, as Johnson said about Mrs. Woffington and
her tea, 'It is strong, and red as blood.' I take English tea, which I
buy by the caddy, and wherever I am, there are my caddy and my
dog--Fussy and caddy. Without them 'Othello's occupation's gone.'"

At the custom-house I gave the customary tip, for I had been
confidentially informed that no official on the landing-stage, calling
himself a gentleman, would misinterpret my courtesy, or