" and the "Alabama" out of "the privy purse,' also for arms for the South; but, said they, the North will pay you off soon! They considered Butler just the man for New Orleans! Captain Cook is a capital sailor, most attentive to his ship, and a gentleman. The cabins of the "Australasian" (a ship built for the Australian Steam Company, which failed) are more roomy than those of the "Scotia :" she was built in 1857, by Mr. Thompson of Glasgow: she is 370 feet long, 40 beam, screw of 600 horse-power, 30 furnaces, and burns 130 tons of coal a day. On the 11th we ran 338 miles. We reached Queenstown on the 15th of November, nine and a half days from New York. On the 16th, Sunday, we landed at Liverpool, and that evening I found at Chester several shipmates who had landed at Queenstown, expecting to be at London the sooner; but so it was not to be; and we, who stuck to the ship, had the best of it, not only in purse, but in comfort. On the 18th of November I had the pleasure of reporting to my aged father-in-law that, by God's blessing, my "Errand to the South" had not been in vain. |