Since
then, things have gone on prosperously, but we have only to-night come
in sight of the lights on Cape Clear. The sea mercifully is somewhat
smoother, and has allowed me to write this long story; and I am going to
bed with a fairer prospect of sleep than I have had for the last few
nights.
_Sunday night, Sept. 12th._--The wind got up again in the night, and has
delayed us much, so that we are still outside the bar of the Mersey:
for some hours it has been doubtful whether we should land to-night in
Old England, or pass another night on board. The uncertainty of our fate
has caused an evening of singular excitement, owing to several of the
passengers going perpetually on deck and bringing down news, either that
we were in the act of crossing the bar, or that we had crossed it, or
that all this was wrong and that we were still outside. As often as it
was announced, and that with the most positive assertion, that we should
land to-night, there was great joy and glee among all the passengers,
excepting ourselves and a few others who had visions of a late Custom
House examination in a dark and dismal night with pouring rain, and a
conviction that landing before morning would not bring us to London any
sooner than doing so early to-morrow, and so we secretly hoped all the
time that we were neither on nor over the bar.
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