the gaiety, roominess, excellent cheer, and
jolly companions, are enough to make a
sailor of the veriest land-lubber that was ever
nailed to a desk. A first class man-of-war,
too, from its size and shape, and weight, does
not roll much except in very heavy seas, and
then the motion is generally so steady and
measured, that you may escape sickness
altogether. Especially if you lay on a sofa
and read novels in very bad weather, when
you will hardly feel the motion at all. Indeed,
laying down, as long as you can practise it,
is almost an infallible remedy for sea-sickness,
but I did not mention it when speaking of
yachting, because people do not go on pleasure
trips to pass the time on a sofa or in bed. It
may be well to caution young gentlemen also,
that they are not wanted on the deck of a
man-of-war in bad weather, and that if they
do not attend to this advice, they may get a
rebuke even from the most polite of captains,
that is likely enough to offend their dignity.

In choosing your berth in ships, if you have
any choice about it, get as near the centre of
the vessel as possible. The motion will
trouble you less, and it, is as great an advantage
as getting your back to the engine in a
railway carriage, or your face to the horses in
a coach; take care if possible to have a
window in your berth, and one that you can
open, that you may have as much fresh air as
is to be found, if the weather will allow it.
Do not ask questions; take especial care not
to make any joking prophecy about going to
the bottom, or talk of having had a prosperous
voyage hitherto, or whistle when the wind is
blowing, or suppose you will get into port on
such or such a day, for all sailors are
superstitious; it is second nature with them. Be
quiet, therefore, about the sea, and all that
in it is, and the ship, and the sails thereof,
and the sailors, and above all make no
observations about the weather. If you do you
will be certain to touch somebody's sore place.
Enthusiastic yachters will tell you that you
cannot catch cold from being wet with
saltwater; but I am sorry, from my own personal
experience, to be obliged to assert the
contrary; therefore, on with your dreadnoughts
when seas run high, and beware of it.
Beware also of how you wash in it, for if you do
not use fresh water afterwards, and dry
yourself very carefully, you will have but a
fidgetty day afterwards. In fact, either bathe
in it entirely, in which case it will not hurt
you, or do not wash in it at all. If you are
too doubtful of your swimming capacities to
jump gallantly over the side, and trust
entirely to your own thews and sinews for a
glorious bath, make acquaintance with one
of the sailors, fasten a well padded strap
round your chest, securing it in its place by
shoulder straps; to this harness fasten
firmly a strong rope (mind it is long enough),
and then go off headforemost: you cannot hurt.
It is a treat however that cannot of course be
indulged in when the ship is under canvass.

Those lazy barges in Holland are amusing
enough to travel by if you have plenty of
time on your hands, and you will get many a
scene for your sketch-book in them if you
have an artist's eye. Indeed, this is by far
the best way of seeing Holland properly. If
a good painter, too, would consent to rough
it on a raft going down the Rhine, he would
get some fine subjects, and see the noble
river under aspects unknown to the everyday
traveller by the steamer. The fires of the
charcoal burners on the hills by night, the
solitary lights from the watchers' huts among
the vines, the frowning tower and beetling
crag, awful in the darkness, would suggest a
thousand new ideas to the poet and painter;
while, to a man who really understands
German, the talk of the boatman, full of story
and superstitions, would not be without its
charm, and his expenses would not exceed a
shilling a day! Rowing against the stream
of the Rhine is unfortunately out of the
question, and in consequence of shifting sands
and other things it would be, I am told,
dangerous to row down stream, otherwise a
pleasant thing enough. The dress of the people
seems to go a hundred years back, and to
acquire a wild picturesque character that is
altogether lost during the annual invasion of
the foreigners. A Rhine peasant in December
is a very different person to the same man
in July. The sheepskin coat, the fur cap, the
muff, the snow shoes, make quite a character
of him, and the red dresses of the women
are pretty indeed. Spend six weeks, too, at
Coblentz, in winter, and you will know more of
the people when you go away, than in a score
of summers. You will find yourself admitted
into their pleasures, and will become familiar
with quaint and beautiful scenes. Winter is
the season of enjoyment, too, in Germany:
the season of " Wein-lesen," a sort of
Bacchanalian festival; the time of song, and
mirth, and Christmas trees, and dancing, and
love-making, and match-making, and
marriages. Even your innkeeper becomes a
pleasant fellow with a racy wit, instead of
the unconscionable harpy presiding over a
trap to catch travellers. I once was in
Germany at this time of the year, and found
that I had never before known the real charm
of sauerkraut and black puddings; or what
an odd, singing, dancing, saving, dreaming,
stuffing, love-making, visiting, lazy, gossipping,
speculating, friendshippy (there is no other
word for it), maudlin, smoking, soaking life
the Germans lead, when really at home and
left to their own devices.

Your German, independently of his summer
excursion—which is quite a necessity with
him—is a traveller at heart. On the other
hand, your Spaniard, Italian, Frenchman,
Swede, Dane, Portuguese, and Oriental,
appear to have a distaste for travelling. Go
where you will, you may find an Englishman,
a Dutchman, a German, and an American;
other nations like to stop at home.