164
                   Return to New York City,
stars and moon overhead.   All day the vessel
rolled from side to side, �with a long uneasy
motion� � very uneasy, I should say, to those
prone to sea-sickness.       Scribbled up diary,
idled, took cigars on deck.        Four passengers
grouped near the chimney-pipe talking Secession
� found it not interesting or novel.     Turned
in by 9.        And thus passed my thirty-fifth
birthday.   I knew Hannah had prayed for
me and that I was thought of at home, lit-
tle imagining where I might be, and I hoped
God might let me get back to them someday.
  16. Saturday.  Fine weather, but colder.
Making good progress northwards.  Talk with
a young Trojan (N.Y.) of Southern proclivi-
ties.    Loafing, packing up &c.  By 7 P.M.
we reached New York, when it was cold enough,
with ice-flakes in the river.       Half-an-hour�s
disembarkation with a rain-accompaniment.
In carriage with three fellow-passengers, one
a woman, who all got out at the Astor House,
I kept on to Bleecker.      It was a beastly,
drenching night, but how glad and familiar
Broadway seemed to me! how curious it was
to feel in perfect safety! to have no secret
consciousness of being in indefinite peril! Ar-