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VOYAGE OF THE POTOMAC. 
[May, 
joyous one in which the highest zest is given to a party of ani- 
mated and elegant enjoyment — the flowery month of May, 
" When eyes are bright with pleasure, 
And brows with wreaths are crowned." 
At an early hour on the appointed evening, barges were in waiting, 
at the steps of the granite dock, to convey the company on 
board the Potomac, which lay but a short distance from the 
shore, so that the passages were made with ease and rapidity. 
The guests were received, as they stepped upon the frigate's deck, 
by an officer, who escorted them from the spar to the gun-deck, 
when another presented them to the commodore and his lady, in 
the after-cabin. This portion of the ship was a place of general 
promenade; while the spar-deck, from the mainmast to the taf- 
ferel, covered with a spacious awning, constituted the extensive 
and brilliant ball-room, lined and festooned with a beautiful cluster 
of national flags. 
One extremity of this fairy saloon might well have attracted the 
attention and envy of those classical creations of fancy alluded to 
by one of our best poets, Woodworth : 
" Sea-nymphs leave their coral caves, 
Deep beneath the ocean waves, 
Where they string, with tasteful care, 
Pearls upon their sea-green hair ; ■ 
Thetis' virgin train advances, 
Mingling with our joyous dances !" 
The other extremity of it was admirably illuminated by a 
pyramid of light, arranged with singular effect, and with taste un- 
questionable. A circle of muskets constituted its base, their 
barrels being devoted to the office of candlesticks, while the 
upper portions of the novel chandelier were formed, by a sim- 
ilar necromancy, from a multitude of flower-encompassed bay- 
onets. Wreathed about the whole hung, roses and tulips of every 
colour the poet could dream of, with every description of leaf 
and evergreen that is composed and arrayed in the ideal triumph 
of beauty. 
Far away, in the other extremity of the saloon, rendering still 
more striking the beautiful perspective, hung a transparency of 
