Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1892-10-13

Dear Friends of U. P. S. s., ST. Clairsville, o.:
Continued from last week.
The first thing to do in beginning an
ocean voyage is to look over the list of
names of the passengers and hunt out the
individual belonging to each, and form
your estimate. Taking the list find 80
names, and six of these children. AS to
natiOnalities, find that four of these are
English, four American, and one Irish
man and one Frenchman, and the re-
mainder are Scotch. would not like to
give my first impressions of each, for in
some cases am glad to believe that
changed my opinion. This was especial
ly true of the Frenchman. The French
man, by the way, was thorough Amer
ican, except in the matter of pronuncia-
ton of few words-or more correctly,
1 should say, he was Bostonian, and
this may account in part for his peculiar
pronunciation. He was very polite, and
quite quick at wit. The English were
decidedly "uppish" in their own mind,
and l have mind to prefix "p" to that
word (p-uppish). The Scotch we found
very nice. One lassie could not find any
thing good or nice to say about Ameri-
ca. But she was not slow to say many
things:very decidedly in disfavor of our
beloved country. A Scotch lady who had
lived in Chicago for some years, and
thinks America very nice, appealed to
Mrs. Giffen to say something in defense
of her country when the Scotch lassie had
asserted that she saw nothing in Ameri-
ca that she could call NICE" Mrs Giffen
remarked that she thought the young
lady had been very unfortunate in her
acquaintance in America, and inquired
in what part she was acquainted? The
young lady replied, "the oil region"
"Ah," says Mrs. Giffen, "you should have
seen Ohio;" "And Boston," says the
Frenchman; "And Chicago" says anoth-
er. "The truth is, says Mrs. Giffen, "you
can see England and Scotland in a day, but
few people eUer see America" But these
conversations were afterward among the
passengers, and the Scotch lassie held
her peace. We little know how very
much we are influenced by our patriotic
feelings in our judgment of other coun-
tries and people. l remember well that
on our way home last year 1 felt that all
1 had seen in Egypt, Italy, Switzerland,
E,ro o, En, nr Caofland xvac oalinca6
by our own native land, and that the
Ohio Valley was the most beautiful of
all; and by the time we reached Bridge
port, was in such state of enthusiasm
that 1 believe that 1 could have con
vinced even a ScOtchman that even
Bridgeport was grand. The fact is. ev-
cry country has some things little su-
perior to most others, and every country
has many things that even the most en-
thusiastic patriot could wish different.
Our voyage across the Atlantic was
very monotonOus, and accompanied with
the usual amount of sea-sickness. We
sailed to Glasgow, and stopped off
the North Coast of Ireland, and there
encountered what the sailors called
"Irish weather." l feel inclined to ex-
press my disgust for Irish weather-but
am reminded that some of our very
worthy ancestors came from that region,
and would not wish to give Offense to
any one; then, too, it was Scotch sailors
who made that remark, and we must
make some allowance. 1 hope all Irish
weather is not as bad as the specimen we
had last Saturday and Saturday night.
Sabbath morning was foggy and dismal
enough. About 10 o'clock it began to
rain, and did not cease to pour all day
and night. L was very sorry for this, as
it prevented us seeing the coast as we en-
ter Glasgow, which is said to be very fine.
We landed at Greenock, which is about
20 miles from Glasgow, and here had to
pass the ordeal of the customs, and 1
think of all customs arrangements this
is the worst. The baggage of steelage,
second cabin and saloon passengers was
all heaped together, and we were told to
"pitch in" The confusion that followed
cannot be imagined. We finally succeed
ed in rescuing all our belongings from
the chaos, and in safety we reached the
hotel weary enough. We remain here
few days in order to attend to some mat
ters of business, and then on to Edin-
burgh. Yours sincerely,
J. K. GIFFEN.
FEW people are aware of the enormous