104 LIFE OF HORACE BENEDICT BE SAUSSURE 



passage. The sea anywhere is formidable to eyes and stomachs 

 new to it. When Bernese guides are taken to the Caucasus it is not 

 the risks of a strange mountain chain and wild people, but those 

 of the Black Sea a name of terror that count most in their 

 minds and alarm their families. De Saussure, writing to Bonnet, 

 begs him not to tell his wife's grandmother, Madame Lullin, of 

 their adventure till he can give the news that they are safe in 

 England. In the end, to shorten the sea voyage, he hired a 

 luxurious boat and sailed through the estuaries and among the 

 islands to Flushing, and thence, after crossing the Scheldt, 

 drove to Ostend. 



The Straits of Dover proved quite as great an ordeal as had 

 been anticipated, and de Saussure's journal gives a tragic de- 

 scription of physical sufferings so unfamiliar to the victim as to 

 call from him for particular description. De Saussure is at pains 

 to record that it was the downward roll that made him suffer 

 most, and that he found temporary relief by accommodating 

 his breathing to the movements of the vessel, drawing in 

 his breath as it plunged. ' A lesson,' he remarks, ' for next 

 time.' 



In the circumstances it was surely brave of him to go on 

 deck at 4 A.M. and view the scene. 



' The vessel was now in mid-Channel. No land was in sight. The 

 wind was always very strong. Heavens ! how small did the packet 

 that in the port had seemed so large, look now in the middle of this 

 immense space. The sailors were lying down and perfectly still, for 

 the steadiness of the breeze relieved them of their task. A profound 

 silence prevailed everywhere ; there were no sounds except the wind 

 in the sails and the noise of the waves beating on the sides of the 

 ship, or against one another. The whole surroundings gave to the 

 vessel an air of abandonment which was vaguely sad and terrible. I 

 admired the perfect evenness of the horizon, which one sees nowhere 

 else so well, and ' 



but we need follow no further. The poor passengers were kept 

 three hours off Dover waiting to enter the harbour. On landing, 

 de Saussure put on his best waistcoat and a red coat and went 

 with his wife to the King's Head, a ' mediocre inn.' On the same 

 afternoon they drove to Canterbury, arriving after dark, and 

 leaving next morning at 5. 30 A.M., much too shattered, apparently, 



