Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 6).djvu/203

ROM the greatest capital of the Old World to the young giant city of the Western Hemisphere is now, comparatively speaking, only a step. The tourist may leave London, for example, on Wednesday or Saturday morning, and, with average fair weather, will cross the Atlantic in six or seven days from Liverpool. Arriving at New York in the morning, he will have ample time to take his place in a car the same day at noon, and, without any change of train, travel a thousand miles westward during the next twenty-four hours, finding himself the next day in Chicago, scarcely more than a week after his departure from London.

The "Majestic."
From a Painting by W. L. Wyllie, A.R.A.

As a matter of fact, in this age of rapid locomotion on land, sea, and river, the voyage from England to America is an undertaking of scarcely more importance than a trip to Vienna, Rome, or St. Petersburg. It is certain that the last two or three decades have witnessed an astounding development of the means provided for transporting the travelling public with ease and comfort across the broad waters which roll between the Eastern and Western Hemispheres.

My last previous journey from Liverpool to New York was made in 1865, twenty-eight years ago; and the difference between one of the crack Atlantic steamers of that period and the splendidly-appointed modern steamship which recently carried me across the Atlantic seemed to me almost incredible. I do not propose here to institute a comparison which would offer to the reader only a retrospective interest. Suffice it to say that the advantages of the change which has taken place in ocean steam navigation during the past thirty years rest entirely with the improved methods employed at the present day for increasing the rapidity, the security, and the luxury of modern travel.

Through the courtesy of the "White Star" authorities at Liverpool, my companion and myself were permitted to go on board the Majestic some hours before the time appointed to receive the saloon passengers, and were thus enabled to witness the embarkation of nearly a thousand emigrants, on their way to America. Of these large majority were Scandinavians, mostly Swedes, the remainder being of different European nationalities, including a relatively small proportion of English. We stood at the surgeon's elbow as these sturdy passengers filed past and were subjected to the usual rapid exa-