- end_line
- 11861
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T20:48:14.846Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 11791
- text
- Next day was Sunday; and the mid-day sun shone upon a glassy sea.
After the uproar of the breeze and the gale, this profound, pervading
calm seemed suited to the tranquil spirit of a day, which, in godly
towns, makes quiet vistas of the most tumultuous thoroughfares.
The ship lay gently rolling in the soft, subdued ocean swell; while all
around were faint white spots; and nearer to, broad, milky patches,
betokening the vicinity of scores of ships, all bound to one common
port, and tranced in one common calm. Here the long, devious wakes from
Europe, Africa, India, and Peru converged to a line, which braided them
all in one.
Full before us quivered and danced, in the noon-day heat and mid-air,
the green heights of New Jersey; and by an optical delusion, the blue
sea seemed to flow under them.
The sailors whistled and whistled for a wind; the impatient
cabin-passengers were arrayed in their best; and the emigrants
clustered around the bows, with eyes intent upon the long-sought land.
But leaning over, in a reverie, against the side, my Carlo gazed down
into the calm, violet sea, as if it were an eye that answered his own;
and turning to Harry, said, “This America’s skies must be down in the
sea; for, looking down in this water, I behold what, in Italy, we also
behold overhead. Ah! after all, I find my Italy somewhere, wherever I
go. I even found it in rainy Liverpool.”
Presently, up came a dainty breeze, wafting to us a white wing from the
shore—the pilot-boat! Soon a monkey-jacket mounted the side, and was
beset by the captain and cabin people for news. And out of bottomless
pockets came bundles of newspapers, which were eagerly caught by the
throng.
The captain now abdicated in the pilot’s favor, who proved to be a
tiger of a fellow, keeping us hard at work, pulling and hauling the
braces, and trimming the ship, to catch the least _cat’s-paw_ of wind.
When, among sea-worn people, a strange man from shore suddenly stands
among them, with the smell of the land in his beard, it conveys a
realization of the vicinity of the green grass, that not even the
distant sight of the shore itself can transcend.
The steerage was now as a bedlam; trunks and chests were locked and
tied round with ropes; and a general washing and rinsing of faces and
hands was beheld. While this was going on, forth came an order from the
quarter-deck, for every bed, blanket, bolster, and bundle of straw in
the steerage to be committed to the deep.—A command that was received
by the emigrants with dismay, and then with wrath. But they were
assured, that this was indispensable to the getting rid of an otherwise
long detention of some weeks at the quarantine. They therefore
reluctantly complied; and overboard went pallet and pillow. Following
them, went old pots and pans, bottles and baskets. So, all around, the
sea was strewn with stuffed bed-ticks, that limberly floated on the
waves—couches for all mermaids who were not fastidious. Numberless
things of this sort, tossed overboard from emigrant ships nearing the
harbor of New York, drift in through the Narrows, and are deposited on
the shores of Staten Island; along whose eastern beach I have often
walked, and speculated upon the broken jugs, torn pillows, and
dilapidated baskets at my feet.
A second order was now passed for the emigrants to muster their forces,
and give the steerage a final, thorough cleaning with sand and water.
And to this they were incited by the same warning which had induced
them to make an offering to Neptune of their bedding. The place was
then fumigated, and dried with pans of coals from the galley; so that
by evening, no stranger would have imagined, from her appearance, that
the Highlander had made otherwise than a tidy and prosperous voyage.
Thus, some sea-captains take good heed that benevolent citizens shall
not get a glimpse of the true condition of the steerage while at sea.
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