Illinois and Missouri. I hunted with the Indians, slept in their wigwams, and was half tempted to remain with them. I am not conscious of being unstable in my pursuits; but when a lad, I was suffered to run wild; and even to those who have been more rigidly trained than myself, there is something very pleasing in changes and transitions, which, whether they are from "grave to gay," or from "lively to severe," are interesting from their contrasts, and strike our feelings as the lights and shades of a picture do our eyes. Among the Indians, who had seen me bring down a turkey on the wing with a single rifle ball, I had the reputation of being a good hunter, and capable of enduring much fatigue; but my companions in the city considered me as a mere Sabyrite, and seldom found me out of bed before noon.

Your predecessor, Mr. Oldschool, the first Oliver, was the only person whom I have known that equalled me in these indolent propensities; but then, although he never liked to get out of bed, yet he might plead that he never had an inclination to go to it. We lived in adjoining rooms, several winters, and I owe much of the happiness of those seasons to his society and affection. Poor D-! I never think of him without a gush of tenderness about my heart.

But to return: One reason of my indolence was, that I had nothing to do, and no one to direct me how to employ the passing hour. We may be "stretched on the rack of a too easy chain." I found that I yawned much more than those of my acquaintance, who had something to occupy or interest them. I sometimes thought myself capable of better things. "I don't know what to do with myself this summer," said I, to an acquaintance, as we were sauntering along the street,-"I really do not know where to go. I am tired of the city, and yet I linger here, as if I had something to attach me to it. I have rambled in the country till there is little of novelty to attract me there. I cannot mount my horse without some greater inducement than riding for an appetite; and as to my horse, I have not seen him since I came here, although that is so long ago, that if he is alive I fancy the charge for his keeping must amount at least to the sum which I paid for him; and, indeed, unless the grooms ride him, he may have forgot the use of his limbs."

"If you are tired of both city and country," said my companion, "go to Europe." to Europe." "You are fond of poetry, painting, and music-go to Italy." "Upon my word," replied I," it might be very pleasant, and I think, I should like it." "Then I will make some enquiry about a ship to some port there, and let you know if I can hear of one." "Be it so," said I; "I will obey your bidding, should you direct me even to " call spirits from the vasty deep." A few days afterwards he told me, that a ship was ready to sail, bound to Leghorn. All I had to do was to send my trunk on board.

A ship was new to me. I had seen our great lakes, which resemble the ocean, but I had never seen the ocean. I was not, however, so ignorant of either, as an officer of the western army, who accompanied me to Philadelphia, the preceding autumn. He was born on the frontier of Pennsylvania, and when about ten years of age, his father's family was surprised by the Indians, his father and some others killed, and he taken to one of the Indien towns, where he was adopted in an Indian family. The boy grew up among them; but his relations discovered him, and with difficulty prevailed upon him to return to his former home, and associates. A lieutenant's commission was procured for him, and be joined the western troops in a campaign against the Indians, in which he was much distinguished for his gallantry. He had obtained a furlough, and accompanied me to the city. We arrived at night; the next morning he was out at day-light, and it was with difficulty that he found his way back to his lodging. He said that he could with more readiness have found his way through fifty miles of woods, than through five squares in the city. The following day he told me that he had seen a very large ship marching down the river; but he wished me to go to the Delaware with him, for it was the most singular river he had ever seen; one part of the day it ran one way, and at another time, it ran another way,-he was sure of it; for he had been several times at the wharves, and had seen it running different ways with his own eyes. I found he had never heard of the tide, and it was difficult to make him comprehend it. But to return to myself.

On the 23d of June, the ship was ready to sail, and I stepped on board of her at the wharf, and she dropt down to New Castle, where she came to, to take the captain on board, who having something to execute, had been detained at Philadelphia after her sailing. Early the next morning the captain came on board, and I found that he had already met with some adventures on his way. One of the sailors, taking leave of his companions, had got into a frolic, and when the ship left the city, he was missing. As he was an excellent seaman, the captain was unwilling to leave him behind, and after much search had found him, and, to use his own phrase, had chartered a chaise to take them to New Castle. It was dark when they crossed the ferry at Wilmington. The road for a great part of the distance between the ferry and New Castle, passes over the flats, and is bordered on each side by a ditch. The ground in wet weather is knee deep in mud. I was well acquainted with it; for when a boy I had spent many a day in shooting snipes in the marshes in that neighbourhood; and thought it a good feat with a double barrelled gun to kill two rising at the same moment, and flying in different directions. After crossing the ferry, the captain found the darkness increased by a thick fog which coverd the flats, so that

in a little time he could not see the horse before him; the consequence of which was, that driving too much to one side of the road, a wheel of the chaise got on the descending ground, and the captain and his compagnon de voyage, were both thrown into a deep ditch full of water; but as water was their element, they probably came out like Comodore Trumnion, invigorated by their immersion. With much difficulty they got the chaise into its proper position, and as the captain was unwilling to make any more summersets, he placed the sailor in the chaise, with, as he said, a brace in each hand, to follow, while he waded through the mud to cun (explore) the way. Whenever the captain found himself getting into the ditch on his starboard hand, he would call to Jack "port"-to which Jack would reply, with true nautical precision, 66 port it is, sir," and pull the poor horse short up with the rein in his left hand. They got into New Castle covered with mud, about one o'clock in the morning, and the captain, as he did not like to come on board, "unanointed, unannealed," changed his dress, and appeared among us in a very gentlemanly garb.

The ship was the Louisa, a letter of Marque, mounting twelve guns, but appearing to have eighteen, six of them being what the sailors called Quakers; that is, very pacific ones, made of wood. She was commanded by Thomas Hoggard, and had a crew of thirty men. It was during our war with the French, and the owners of the ship had armed her, as a protection from the French privateers, which it was supposed she might fall in with.

The first sight of the ocean must strike the rudest breast with an impression of awe. Its immensity, and even its monotony, is sublime. But the appearance was not entirely new to me. I had seen the great lakes with their" blue tumbling billows, topt with foam," apparently as shoreless as the ocean itself. The ship, however, and my companions were all novel, and when the pilot took his leave, I felt very strongly the sensation which every one must feel who leaves a home which contains many who are extremely dear to him. The pilot left us in the evening. We were then outside of the capes, and the breeze blew fresh and chill. There were many things to be arranged about the ship, at which the sailors busied themselves, and to the whistling of the wind among the rigging was added the frequent piping of the boatswain, as orders were given to perform different evolutions. I put on a great coat and remained on deck. The ship went rapidly through the waves. The spray dashed over her bows, while a train of phosphoric light sparkled in her wake. Velocity gives an impression of power, and produces delightful sensations. Some French writer mentions a countryman of his, whom he met in Arabia, who had grown as wild as the Arabs themselves, who told him that nothing was so delightful to him,

as to be mounted on an Heirie, and in full speed in the Desert. Strange as this may appear, I can readily believe it; but his feeling partly arose from the solitude in which he was placed, enabling him to fancy himself a more important part of creation, than he would have thought himself to be, in the midst of a crowd. I recollect the effect of the solitude of the western prairies, and can recall the thrill of mingled pain and pleasure which is produced by the consciousness of being alone in them. The horizon, without a tree, and as unbroken as the ocean-the clear and cold moon within an hour of setting-a silence that could be felt, interrupted by the howl, at long intervals, of a solitary wolf, which seemed two or three miles distant. I have never thought of the line of Campbell, "The wolf's long howl on Onalaska's shore," without recollecting him of the prairies. On shipboard there was no solitude, every thing was bustle and noise. I went forward, and cast my eyes over the bow, and enjoyed the dashing of the spray, as the ships head was buried in the waves, out of which she rose like a feather, giving a powerful idea of the resistance of a fluid, which could so lightly repel a body of upwards of three hundred tons burthen. Looking ahead, something, at first dimly descried, became more and more distinct; and I soon found it to be a ship, approaching in an opposite direction to our course. Apprehensive that I might alarm my companions improperly, I remained long enough to be fully convinced of the nature and situation of the object in view, when going to a sailor who was engaged at something near me, I said, "there is a vessel." Jack turned to me, but made no answer. I repeated, "there is a vessel before us." Still no reply-but I heard one of the crew at a little distance, ask another, "what does he say?" The wind was very fresh, and the ship having a good deal of sail, healed considerably, which together with her high bulwarks, and the bellying of the sails, prevented the sailors from seeing the approach of the stranger. I was apprehensive that the two ships would strike against each other; and suddenly conceiving that the inattention paid to what I said, might be occasioned by my expressing myself in a dialect not understood on board ship, I called out" a sail ahead!" The man nearest to me sprang forward, and seeing the danger, repeated my call in a voice like a trumpet, the helm was instantly clapped hard up, and the two ships, almost touching, and on different tacks, dashed by each other like the wind. The tars themselves felt it a narrow escape, and the one whose attention I had roused, exclaimed, after holding his breath till we were fairly clear, "d-n my eyes, but that was touch and go!" We supposed that we had been unnoticed by the other ship. Not a word was said on either side. Many vessels, in all probability, are annually lost by coming in collision with each other on the ocean. I have never been sea-sick; but the wind was chilly, and the sea rough, and, I felt a slight

qualmishness that intimated to me the propriety of retiring to my couch, where I slept as well as I could expect to be permitted to do, by the pitching of the vessel, and in a situation so novel. When I went on deck in the morning, I found every thing in excellent regulation. The sun had risen in an unclouded sky; the gale of the preceding evening had moderated to a fine breeze, and blew from a favourable point; and the captain, with a very good-natured countenance, was pacing the deck, apparently pleased

❝to see

The gallant ship so lustily

Furrow the green sea foam."

We were out of sight of land. The sky and the sea were all that the eye found to rest upon; and the variety consisted of the foam-crested billows of the one, and the differently shaped and tinged clouds which passed across the face of the other.

Ön ship board, the character of the persons composing the family is of much importance to our comfort. I think it is Johnson who observed, that to be at sea is to be in prison with the chance of being drowned; except that, in prison you are likely to meet with the most agreeable company: I, therefore, looked around to see how I was situated. The inmates of the cabin were, besides myself, the captain, two mates, and an Italian gentleman, as a passenger. Of the latter I recollect nothing but that he sang agreeably, and appeared to have a tolerably favourable opinion of himself. The captain's appearance told you that he was a sailor; he was about forty years of age; his idiom peculiarly that of his profession, so that at table he would desire a person to scull that plate to him, &c. Of the mates I at that time took little notice; I supposed them your every-day-kind of sailors, with but little knowledge beyond that of their profession; but I was not a physiognomist; if I had been, I would easily have discovered in one of them, "the hand to do, the heart to dare."

I soon found that it would be useful to endeavour to occnpy myself with something in order to prevent my time from hanging heavily on my hands, and I told the captain that I would like to learn how to navigate a ship, and tasked his good nature to tell me the names and show me the uses of the different parts of the rigging, and, in return, I would take upon me all the astronomical calculations necessary to ascertain his longitude. He expressed himself very willing to communicate the knowledge which he possessed of the subject which I was desirous of being acquainted with; but said it would be well not to ask questions of the sailors, who would form a.very unfavourable opinion of one so ignorant as not to know the difference between the mainbrace and the main-top bowline. It was therefore agreed, that all my questions should be asked of him, and I was so apt a