THE JOURNEY TO NEW ZEALAND.
1. By the medium of mere words it is impossible to convey an adequate idea of the grandeur—the surprising loveliness we may say—of the elegant and palatial-like appearance of the steamers which carry the wanderer to New Zealand.
(New Zealand being an island surrounded by water, it is necessary to approach it by boat or balloon. I went in a boat.)
2. When a stranger stands for the first time before a New Zealand steamer, and views the magnificence and completeness of the arrangements, he is struck dumb with admiration.
(These steamers are managed entirely for the benefit of the public, and not as a source of revenue. The round trip costs £21, wines not included.)
3. The lawn-like evenness of the ocean, the incomprehensibility of the surrounding space, and the changing constellations in the heavens, surpass the wildest flights of Eastern imagination.
(Prussic acid is not a good cure for sea-sickness. It is poison.)
The elegance of the cabins, which by day are princelyparlours, and by night gorgeously furnished couches for repose, hold you spell-bound with enchantment.
(We think it is well to undress when you go to bed. Some travellers sleep in their boots.)
4. The prodigality in the equipment, the skill in construction, the perfection of management, are creations of gigantic intellects which can never be obliterated from the feeblest mind.
(Never tell the captain that he is going the wrong way, or the engineer that there is a rat in the cylinder.)
5. Oh! electric luminosity! Oh! soft and downy couches! Oh! Lucullian food, what are ye to the lamps, and beds, and dinners on board vessels going to New Zealand?
(Bar closes at 10, and lights are put out at 10.30 sharp.) You struggle over tables in the dark, and end by reaching the wrong cabin. A cry ofthievesawakens the whole ship, and you make a public apology to a lot of people dressed in long white clothes.
6. Tableau: what revelations of beauty!