he hoped, he said, when he returned, to have many stories and adventures to relate to them. The vessel in which he was to sail, had to touch at Cork, in the South of Ireland, for a part of her cargo. It was, therefore, at that city he embarked. Sailing down the River Lee, they passed the last point of land at about nine in the evening-and it was long after it had ceased to be visible, that William, who never quitted the deck, but with an interest only to be under. stood by those who, for the first time, have quit. ted home, and trusted themselves to the sea, kept his eyes constantly directed towards the country he was leaving, spied a light in the window of a fisherman's hut. It was the last object he beheld in Ireland, and, as he advanced, this feeble light mixed with the stars, until, at last, he no longer could distinguish it. The impression it made on him was indelible-he thought of the city he had dwelt in for twenty-six years; he thought of his deceased parents, and the idea involuntarily arose that, perhaps, he would never return. Youth, however, is not the season for despondency in a very short time, therefore, he had recovered himself sufficiently to observe what was passing around him, and, indeed, there was enough to interest him. At first, the course lay in a southerly direction, till they made the island of Teneriffe, and the middle parts of the Earth, and as the wind was often contrary, he was, as is usual with most persons : on their first sea voyage, ton sick to attend to any thing else; but when the vessel had reached the point above mentioned, it fell into what is called the trade wind, which carried it along almost in a due westerly direction, the sea being so calm, that the Spaniards gave this part of it the name of the Ladies' Gulph ; indeed, so even was their progress, that the sailors were scarcely obliged to touch the sails, so that the voyage might almost be made in an open boat. He also found that there was a regular current in the sea, which flows from the coast of Africa, on the East, to that of America, on the West; this, he was informed by the Captain, was caused by the Earth, which, turning round upon an axis (just as if you were to pass a string through an orange from top to bottom, and give it a whirling motion,) gives an opposite direction to the waters of the sea: look at the Map, said he, and you will see the Continent of America stretching North and South, and directly standing like a wall in the way of this current; it therefore, winds round that circular bason, in which the islands of the West Indies are scattered, and passing up along the coast of North America, as far as the bank of Newfoundland, it returns towards Europe. We have already mentioned the current which carried Philips towards the West, and every seaman knows that there is another back current, which sets in from this great bank towards the East. If you read the voyage of Columbus, added he, you will see, that he was led to believe in the existence of a new world by various things which were cast ashore in Spain and Portugal; there were two dead bodies, and also pieces of bamboo, which had been evidently carried along by a current, and this led him to believe that there was another continent towards the west, from which these things must have come. The next point that excited our traveller's admiration, was the different appearance and beauty of the nights, in these southern latitudes. During his whole life he had been accustomed to see those stars which appear every clear night, the plough, as it is called, the constellation of Orion, or the hunter, &c.--but now he was looking on that part of the sky which was seen by those who inhabit the southern half of the Earth, and, therefore, he no longer saw those with which he had been so familiar-but of all which met his eye none appeared more beautiful than that which is called by Astrono mers the Cross, from the form in which the principal stars lie, making the appearance of a cross; aboard the vessel there were two Spanish seamen, who had crossed the Atlantic be fore, and who never saw it rising at night without its awakening in them religious sentiments: at twelve o'clock at night, the two great stars which make the top and bottom of the Cross, stand exactly across the meridian—it serves, therefore, as an excellent time-piece in South America, to mark the hour, and often afterwards did he hear the guides crying out to one another, "midnight is past, the Cross begins to bend." On the passage Philips had occasion to ob serve a great many of those animals of the deep which he had read of, the Sea Unicorn, which carries a long spiral bone, stretching out from its nose, like a twisted tapering rope: the one he saw was about eight feet in length, and its horn about four: this is a weapon dreadfully offensive to the Whale, and when polished is considered not at all inferior to ivory, either in whiteness or hardness. He observed, also, another animal, which carries an offensive weapon, the Saw Fish. The projecting bone of this is three or four feet long, flat, and armed on both sides with sharp pointed strong spikes, which give it somewhat the appearance of a saw. This instrument, which is covered over with the same rough, slimy, dark coloured skin that covers the whole animal, begins to spread near the eyes, and this continues spreading till it forms the head of a flattish triangular appearance; above the eyes are two large holes, and under these, the mouth, which is something in the form of a half moon, apparently without teeth; the body of the Saw Fish is not much longer than the head, that is, the length of the two together is 14 feet, and yet small as it is, it fights with the largest Whales, till the sea all around is dyed with their blood, seldom quitting its adversary till it has van quished and killed it. Where every object was new, we may well suppose that the voyage produced sufficient to occupy the mind. It is said that a sailor's is a listless life, and it may be true of those who pass their lives on board ship, but to the active enquiring mind of Philips, nothing that he saw was devoid of interest: at one time he was mounting the ladder to look out from the main-top, when there was a sail in sight, observing her at first like a speck upon the distant view, presently showing more and more of her masts as she came nearer, and last of all her hull; at another time, looking from the deck upon the shoals of Porpoises, tumbling about, or the ravenous Shark, darting after its prey, or the Flying Fish, seeking that safety in the air which it could not find in its own element; at others discoursing with the Captain, and the more intelligent seamen upon the various incidents of a sea-faring life. He was, on one occasion, thus engaged in conversation with the mate, when they saw some. thing, the shape of which they could not at first discern, drifting at a distance. It proved to be the mast of a ship that must have been com. pletely wrecked, for there were the remains of handkerchiefs, by which some of the crew appeared to have lashed themselves to this spar, to B |