d distinguish a smack
of snuff in the former from a flavour of boiling and dish-cloths in the
second. As a matter of fact, I have seen passengers, after many sips,
still doubting which had been supplied them. In the way of eatables at
the same meal we were gloriously favoured; for in addition to porridge,
which was common to all, we had Irish stew, sometimes a bit of fish, and
sometimes rissoles. The dinner of soup, roast fresh beef, boiled salt
junk, and potatoes was, I believe, exactly common to the steerage and
the second cabin; only I have heard it rumoured that our potatoes were
of a superior brand; and twice a week, on pudding days, instead of duff,
we had a saddle-bag filled with currants under the name of a
plum-pudding. At tea we were served with some broken meat from the
saloon; sometimes in the comparatively elegant form of spare patties or
rissoles; but as a general thing mere chicken-bones and flakes of fish,
neither hot nor cold. If these were not the scrapings of plates their
looks belied them sorely; yet we were all too hungry to be proud, and
fell to these leavings greedily. These, the bread, which was excellent,
and the soup and porridge which were both good, formed my whole diet
throughout the voyage; so that except for the broken meat and the
convenience of a table I might as well have been in the steerage
outright. Had they given me porridge again in the evening I should have
been perfectly contented with the fare. As it was, with a few biscuits
and some whisky and water before turning in, I kept my body going and my
spirits up to the mark.

The last particular in which the second cabin passenger remarkably
stands ahead of his brother of the steerage is one altogether of
sentiment. In the steerage there are males and females; in the second
cabin ladies and gentlemen. For some time after I came aboard I thought
I was only a male; but in the course of a voyage of discovery between
decks, I came on a brass plate, and learned that I was still a
gentleman. Nobody knew it, of course. I was lost in the crowd of males
and females, and rigorously confined to the same quarter of the deck.
Who could tell whether I housed on the port or starboard side of
Steerage No. 2 and 3? And it was only there that my superiority became
practical; everywhere else I was incognito, moving among my inferiors
with simplicity, not so much as a swagger to indicate that I was a
gentleman after all, and had broken meat to tea. Stil