f he chooses, of seeing nothing
at all that has to do with a ship, not even the sea.

For there is one thing that the designers of this sea-palace seem to
have forgotten and seem to be a little ashamed of--and that is the sea
itself. There it lies, an eternal prospect beyond these curtained
windows, by far the most lovely and wonderful thing visible; but it
seems to be forgotten there. True, there is a smoke-room at the after
extremity of the deck below this, whose windows look out into a great
verandah sheeted in with glass from which you cannot help looking upon
the sea. But in order to counteract as much as possible that austere and
lovely reminder of where we are, trellis-work has been raised within the
glass, and great rose-trees spread and wander all over it, reminding you
by their crimson blossoms of the earth and the land, and the scented
shelter of gardens that are far from the boisterous stress of the sea.
No spray ever drifts in at these heights, no froth or spume can ever in
the wildest storms beat upon this verandah. Here, too, as almost
everywhere else on the ship, you can, if you will, forget the sea.

III

The first afternoon at sea seems long: every face is strange, and it
seems as though in so vast a crowd none will ever become familiar,
although one of the miracles of sea-life is the way in which the blurred
crowd resolves itself into individual units, each of which has its
character and significance. And if we are really to know and understand
and not merely to hear with our ears the tale of what happened to the
greatest ship in the world, we must first prepare and soak our minds in
her atmosphere, and take in imagination that very voyage which began so
happily on this April day. At the end of the afternoon came the coast of
France, and Cherbourg--a sunset memory of a long breakwater, a distant
cliff crowned with a white building, a fussing of tugs and hasty
transference of passengers and mails; and finally the lighthouse showing
a golden star against the sunset, when the great ship's head was turned
to the red west, and the muffled and murmuring song of the engines was
taken up again. Perhaps our traveller, bent upon more discoveries, dined
that night not in the saloon, but in the restaurant, and, following the
illuminated electric signs that pointed the way along the numerous
streets and roads of the ship, found his way aft to the Cafe-Restaurant;
where instead of stewards were French wai