The strong winds were westerly and fast increasing
to a moderate gale. The north star was hidden and now failed to confirm
the accuracy of the ship's compasses.
The first and fourth officers were pacing the bridge. The latter was
glad that the engines were working at full speed, as every stroke of
the pistons carried him nearer his pretty cottage in the suburbs of
Liverpool. Captain Morgan had dropped asleep on the lounge in his cozy
room just back of the wheel. Most of the passengers and crew off duty
slept soundly, though some were dreaming of wife and children in far away
homes, and others of palaces, parks, and castles in foreign countries.
It was difficult for Mrs. Harris to get much rest as the waves dashing
against the ship often awakened her, and her thoughts would race with the
Cincinnati Express which was swiftly bearing her husband and Gertrude
back to Harrisville and perhaps to trouble and poverty. While Mrs. Harris
knew that her husband was wealthy, she was constantly troubled with fears
lest she and her family should sometime come to want. Her own father had
acquired a fortune in Ireland, but changes in the British tariff laws had
rendered him penniless, and poverty had driven her mother with seven
other children to America.
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