294 HOMEWARD BOUND. 



great path of the human race ; and one had to reason witli 

 oneself Foolish soul, whiiher would you go ? You cannot 

 go westward for ev^er. If you go up the Oroonoco, you will 

 long to go up the Meta. If you get to Sta. Fe de Bogota, 

 you will not be content till you cross the Andes and see 

 Cotopaxi and Chimborazo. When you look down on the 

 Pacific, you will be craving to go to the Gallapagos, after 

 Darwin ; and then to the Marquesas, after Herman Melville ; 

 and then to the Fijis, after Seeman; and then to Borneo, 

 after Brooke ; and then to the Archipelago, after Wallace ; 

 and then to Hindostan, and round the world. And wdien 

 you get home, the westward fever will be stronger on you 

 than ever, and you will crave to start again. Go home at 

 once, like a reasonable man, and do your duty, and thank 

 God for what you have been allowed to see ; and try to 

 become of the same mind as that most brilliant of old ladies, 

 who boasted that she had not been abroad since she saw the 

 Apotheosis of Voltaire, before the French Eevolution ; and did 

 not care to go, as long as all manner of clever people were 

 kind enough to go instead, and write cliarming books about 

 what they had seen for her. 



But the westward fever was slow to cool : and with wistful 

 eyes we w^atched the sun by day, and Venus and the moon 

 by night, sink dow^n into the gulf, to lighten lands which we 

 should never see. A few days more, and we were steaming 



