en well ascertained that they never rise more than twelve or
fifteen feet above the general level of the water; and if we allow the
same quantity for the depth of the trough, or hollow between two waves,
we shall have from twenty-five to thirty feet as the utmost altitude
which any swell of water can have, reckoning from the most depressed
portions of the surface near it. Now, in a first-class Atlantic steamer,
there are two full stories, so to speak, above the surface of the sea,
and a promenade deck above the uppermost one. This brings the head of
the spectator, when he stands upon the promenade dock and surveys the
ocean around him, to the height of twenty-five or thirty feet above the
surface of the water. The elevation at which he stands varies
considerably, it is true, at different portions of the voyage. When the
ship first comes out of port she is very heavily laden, as she has on
board, in addition to the cargo, all the coal which she is to consume
during the whole voyage. This is an enormous quantity--enough for the
full lading of what used to be considered a large ship in former days.
This coal being gradually consumed during the voyage, the steamer is
lightened; and thus she swims lighter and lighter as she proceeds, being
four or five feet higher out of the water when she reaches the end of
her voyage than she was at the beginning.

Thus the height at which the passenger stands above the waves, when
walking on the promenade deck of an Atlantic steamer, varies somewhat
during the progress of the voyage; but it is always, or almost always,
so great as to bring his head above the crests of the waves. Thus he
looks down, as it were, upon the heaviest seas, and this greatly
diminishes their apparent magnitude and elevation. On the contrary, to
one going to sea in vessels as small as those with which Columbus made
the voyage when he discovered America, the loftiest billows would rise
and swell, and toss their foaming crests far above his head, as he clung
to the deck to gaze at them. They would seem at times ready to
overwhelm him with the vast and towering volumes of water which they
raised around him. Then, when the shock which was produced by the
encounter of one of them was passed, and the ship, trembling from the
concussion, rose buoyantly over the swell, being small in comparison
with the volume of the wave, she was lifted so high that she seemed to
hang trembling upon the brink of it, ready to plunge to cer