On Monday we came in sight of Cape Cod, and I thought we should never get round it. Those who have noticed Cape Cod on the map have no doubt observed that it is shaped like a human foot; and we went gliding along near its sole, traveling from heel to toe. For hours, I was every moment expecting to go “round the point,” which I imagined I could see all the time a little way ahead: but it kept receding all the while, like an _ignis fatuus_, till I began to fancy that the foot belonged to some great giant, who was bending his knee, and drawing it back stealthily, in order to straighten it out again and give us a kick.
WE arrived in Boston Harbor Monday afternoon about four o’clock, and entered a very dense fog about the same time. The fog was so thick for several minutes that objects could not be seen from one end of the vessel to the other. The engine was quickly stopped, and we narrowly escaped a collision with a steamer. But in the course of ten minutes, the heavy mist swept down the harbor in a body, and left all clear around us; when we were somewhat surprised to find ourselves within one hundred yards of the shore. We floated up to the pier at the foot of State street; the propeller was soon made fast, and I immediately went ashore, in the midst of a soaking rain that seemed to be sent just then for my express benefit. I got into a carriage—one that had sleigh-runners substituted for wheels—and rode to a good comfortable hotel which the Captain had recommended.
It rained till after dark; and, in fact, I retired to my room, went asleep and left it raining. I remember that I heard some one remark, just before I retired, that if it kept on raining,—he didn’t say how long—it would spoil the sleighing, and wheels would come into requisition again: for in the New England States, especially Massachusetts, and those lying north of it, a vehicle with wheels is seldom seen in the depth of winter. The sleighing usually continues good till spring, and the wheels are removed for a time from all vehicles, and runners are adjusted in their stead. Not even the street-cars or omnibuses are any exceptions: they, too, cease to rattle, roll and rumble over the streets, and go gliding about with so little noise that one gets the queer idea into his head that they are barefooted.