If A
Person Asked My Advice, Before Undertaking A Long Voyage,
My Answer Would Depend Upon His Possessing A Decided Taste
For Some Branch Of Knowledge, Which Could By This Means Be
Advanced.
No doubt it is a high satisfaction to behold various
countries and the many races of mankind, but the pleasures
gained at the time do not counterbalance the evils.
It is
necessary to look forward to a harvest, however distant
that may be, when some fruit will be reaped, some good
effected.
Many of the losses which must be experienced are obvious;
such as that of the society of every old friend, and of the
sight of those places with which every dearest remembrance
is so intimately connected. These losses, however, are at
the time partly relieved by the exhaustless delight of
anticipating the long wished-for day of return. If, as poets
say, life is a dream, I am sure in a voyage these are the
visions which best serve to pass away the long night. Other
losses, although not at first felt, tell heavily after a period:
these are the want of room, of seclusion, of rest; the jading
feeling of constant hurry; the privation of small luxuries, the
loss of domestic society and even of music and the other
pleasures of imagination. When such trifles are mentioned, it is
evident that the real grievances, excepting from accidents, of
a sea-life are at an end. The short space of sixty years has
made an astonishing difference in the facility of distant
navigation.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 766 of 776
Words from 205330 to 205587
of 208183
