“Bless me!” I replied, “what a catalogue in one day!  I fear my Mentor will despair of my ultimate perfection.”

“I should have more hope,” he replied, “if you seemed to feel my rebukes more deeply, but you evidently think them of too little consequence to be much disturbed by them.”

As he found even more fault with my husband, we condoled with each other and decided that our friend was rather hypercritical and that we were as nearly perfect as mortals need be for the wear and tear of ordinary life.  Being both endowed with a good degree of self-esteem, neither the praise nor the blame of mankind was overpowering to either of us.  As the voyage lasted eighteen days—­for we were on a sailing vessel—­we had time to make some improvement, or, at least, to consider all friendly suggestions.

At this time Mr. Birney was very much in love with Miss Fitzhugh of Geneseo, to whom he was afterward married.  He suffered at times great depression of spirits, but I could always rouse him to a sunny mood by introducing her name.  That was a theme of which he never grew weary, and, while praising her, a halo of glory was to him visible around my head and I was faultless for the time being.  There was nothing in our fellow-passengers to break the monotony of the voyage.  They were all stolid, middle-class English people, returning from various parts of the world to visit their native land.

When out of their hearing, Mr. Birney used to ridicule them without mercy; so, one day, by way of making a point, I said with great solemnity, “Is it good breeding to make fun of the foibles of our fellow-men, who have not had our advantages of culture and education?” He felt the rebuke and blushed, and never again returned to that subject.  I am sorry to say I was glad to find him once in fault.

Though some amusement, in whatever extraordinary way I could obtain it, was necessary to my existence, yet, as it was deemed important that I should thoroughly understand the status of the anti-slavery movement in my own country, I spent most of my time reading and talking on that question.  Being the wife of a delegate to the World’s Convention, we all felt it important that I should be able to answer whatever questions I might be asked in England on all phases of the slavery question.

The captain, a jolly fellow, was always ready to second me in my explorations into every nook and cranny of the vessel.  He imagined that my reading was distasteful and enforced by the older gentlemen, so he was continually planning some diversion, and often invited me to sit with him and listen to his experiences of a sailor’s life.