Page:Letters from Abroad.pdf/110

 101

of our existence. I do not feel sea-sick, but the great fact for us is, that we are the children of the land. This is an immovable fact—and yet, when this fact begins to move, it is not only misery but an affront to us. The whole sea seems to laugh loud at the conceited creatures, who only have a pair of tottering legs and not even a fraction of a fin.

Every moment the dignity of man is outraged by making him helplessly tumble about in an infinite variety of awkwardness. He is compelled to take part in a very broad farce: and nothing can be more humiliating for him than to exhibit a comic appearance in his very sufferings. It is like making the audience roar with laughter by having the clown kicked into all manner of helpless absurdities, While sitting, walking, taking meals, we are constantly being hurled about into unexpected postures, which are shamefully inconvenient.

When Gods try to become funny in their sublime manner of perpetrating jokes, we, mortal creatures, find ourselves ata terrible disadvantage ; for their huge laughter, carried by the millions of roaring waves, in flashing foam, keeps its divine dignity unimpaired, while we, on our side, find our self-respect knocked into pieces. [am the only individual in this steamer, who is vying with the Gods by fashioning my misery into laughing words and refusing to be a mere passive instrument of an elemental foolery. A laughter, which is tyranny, has to be answered