The Sea: Its Stirring Story of Adventure, Peril, & Heroism. Volume 4

We all know what the “Grand Tour” meant a few generations ago, and how without it no gentleman’s education was considered complete. Now-a-days the journey can be made by almost any one who can command thirty or forty pounds, and the only really grand tour left is that around [pg 2]the world. M. Verne tells us—inferentially, at all events—that it can be made in eighty days, while Puck, as we know, speaks of putting a “girdle round the earth in forty minutes.” But this statement of the popular French author, like many others put forth in his graphic and picturesque works, must be taken cum grano salis. It could be, undoubtedly, but it is very questionable whether any one has yet accomplished the feat. Could one ensure the absolute “connection” as it is technically termed, of all the steamship lines which would have to be employed it might be done; or better, one vessel with grand steaming and sailing qualities might perform the “Voyage Round the World” in the given time. But M. Jules Verne, it will be remembered, paints his hero as landing at various points, and as performing acts of bravery and chivalry en route, such as the episode of rescuing a Hindoo widow from the Suttee; finding time to lounge and drink in San Francisco “saloons,” and being attacked by Indians, who would wreck the overland train; and still, with all delays, he is able to reach London in time to win his wager. The very idea of describing a journey round the world as an act of eccentricity is peculiarly French. The Englishman who can afford to make it is especially envied by his friends, and not considered mildly mad. We have before us a list of books of travel, all published within the last few years, and in circulation at the ordinary libraries. Thirteen of these works describe voyages round the world, and they are mostly the productions of amateur rather than of professional writers. So easy, indeed, is the trip now-a-days, that two of these records are modestly and deprecatingly described as “Rambles,” while one of the best of them is the work of a clever and enthusiastic lady,1 whose excellent husband, in and out of Parliament, has earnestly and persistently studied “poor Jack’s” best interests. This lady is evidently no fresh-water sailor, and would put to shame the land-lubber described in a very old song:—

“A tar, all pitch, did loudly bawl, sir,
‘All hands aloft!’—‘Sweet sir, not I.
Though drowning I don’t fear at all, sir,
I hate a rope exceedingly.’”2
Another work, by a young lady in her teens, is entitled, “By Land and Ocean; or, the Journals and Letters of a Young Girl who went to South Australia with a Lady, thence alone to Victoria, New Zealand, Sydney, Singapore, China, Japan, and across the Continent of America.” Perhaps the most remarkable, however, of modern female travellers is a German lady,3 who left Paris with only seven and a half francs in her pocket, and yet managed to go round the entire globe. It must be admitted that she had many friends abroad who helped her, and passed her on to others who could and did assist her in every way. Still, the voyages and travels she made denote the possession of a goodly amount of pluck.

The item of speed is of great importance, and may well be considered in connection with a voyage round the globe. Verne’s title would have been deemed the raving of a [pg 3]lunatic had it been published before the age of steam, while in the first days of that great power which has now revolutionised the world it would have been regarded as absurd. The wooden Cunarder which, forty years ago, conveyed Charles Dickens on his first trip to America took double the ordinary time occupied now in making the voyage; and as a journalist has said, between such a vessel “and such ships as the Arizona (Guion line), the Germanic (White Star line), the City of Berlin (Inman line), and the Gallia (Allan line), there is undoubtedly not less difference than between the Edinburgh or Glasgow mail-coaches and a modern express train.” The Arizona has made the round trip—that is, the voyage from Queenstown, Ireland, to Sandy Hook, New York, and back again—in fifteen days. The Inman line has been specially celebrated for quick passages, whilst their “crack” steamer, the City of Berlin, has made the single trip outwards in seven days, fourteen hours, and twelve minutes, and inwards in seven days, fifteen hours, and forty-eight minutes. The City of Brussels and the City of Richmond have done nearly as well, while other steamships of the same line have made the trip in a very few hours and minutes more time. Think of considering minutes in a voyage of 3,000 miles!