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dropped, and shifted just where we did not want it.
Thursday, [March] 14th
Today we were tacking about but have made little progress, since the wind is dead against us. The weather is beautifully serene and calm. Nothing to be seen on all sides but the wide ocean, except here and there a ship in the distance. Pleasant walking on deck, though the wind was very cold.
Often are my thoughts going back to bygone days. Were I not naturally sanguine, and of a cheerful disposition, I should deeply feel at having left so many friends, among whom since Christmas I had spent so many social happy hours. Yet I cannot help feeling that there will be no more enjoyment till my wanderings are all over, and I am once more safely settled down in old England.
Wednesday, March 20th
Since last Wednesday I have had rather a strange week of it, and have been unable to make any addition to my journal. How the time has gone I cannot imagine, and today having aroused from a sort of stupor, I inquired the day of the month and was quite astonished. I will endeavor to give some idea, as far as memory goes, just what I have gone through.
On Friday the 15th we had a stormy day, and the weather being dead against us we had to keep tacking about. We came in sight of the Isle of Wight, and then off again in sight of France, then turned about and came back again. The seasickness came on with a vengeance, and I felt that poorly, I was a misery to myself, and all on board. The only consolation I had as I sat in the cabin, over a basin, labouring away, was to hear the captain's wife in the opposite room, doing the same thing. So I felt I was not quite alone in the world. My only comfort was to get to bed and try and sleep as much as possible. As to eating it was entirely out of the question.
On Saturday we came off Portland Bill, and then turned round and came again in sight of France. The seasickness increased to a considerable degree, and all I could do was to lay in bed, and be sick, and think over the past, lament over the present, and look forward with gloomy thoughts into the future.