On Having Clambered Over The Ship's Side And Found Myself On Deck, I Was
Somewhat Taken Aback With The Apparently
Inextricable confusion of
everything on board; the slush upon the decks, the crying, the kissing,
the mustering of the passengers,
The stowing away of baggage still left
upon the decks, the rain and the gloomy sky created a kind of half-
amusing, half-distressing bewilderment, which I could plainly see to be
participated in by most of the other landsmen on board. Honest country
agriculturists and their wives were looking as though they wondered what
it would end in; some were sitting on their boxes and making a show of
reading tracts which were being presented to them by a serious-looking
gentleman in a white tie; but all day long they had perused the first
page only, at least I saw none turn over the second.
And so the afternoon wore on, wet, cold, and comfortless - no dinner
served on account of the general confusion. The emigration commissioner
was taking a final survey of the ship and shaking hands with this, that,
and the other of the passengers. Fresh arrivals kept continually
creating a little additional excitement - these were saloon passengers,
who alone were permitted to join the ship at Gravesend. By and by a
couple of policemen made their appearance and arrested one of the party,
a London cabman, for debt. He had a large family, and a subscription
was soon started to pay the sum he owed.
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Words from 1619 to 1868
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