Round the world in any number of days

We entered the bay in the dawn—or rather before the dawn; it was very misty; we moved in a vague twilight of blue shadows. I got up to see the bay, but you could see nothing distinctly, nothing but mist and blue shadows; the whole thing very unearthly and beautiful. I went back to my bunk, intending to get up again in half an hour’s time, when it was lighter. But I went to sleep, and when I woke up again we were right against the wharf.

You could hear the bugles from a British man-of-war, the Drake. It was a brilliant, warm, delicious day.

I spent a whole day in the city of Sydney, exploring the stores, riding about aimlessly in the cars. I had luncheon at the Australian Hotel. The waiters were dressed as stewards, and, indeed, many of them are ex-stewards. I thought the food excellent. I visited two excellent bookstores.

When you go to a bookstore in London and ask for any book, you are told they haven’t got it. Here in Sydney I found the men in the stores abnormally intelligent. You could even get different kinds of books written by the same author, which is a difficult feat anywhere. Most booksellers think that if a man writes a book on, say, poultry, it is preposterous to ask for a work of his on political economy or step-dancing. And yet it happens that many writers write books on different subjects—Andrew Lang, for instance. We received the sad news of the death of Andrew Lang at Fremantle. Andrew Lang is an author who spent the large capital of his wit, his learning, his wide sympathies, royally and generously without stint; he was a master of English prose, and some of the best pieces of prose he ever wrote were flung into leaders in the “Daily News.” Those which were afterwards collected in a book called “Lost Leaders” make the most delightful reading. He wrote just as well and just as wittily on street noises or midsummer heat as on Homer, the Young Pretender, or Joan of Arc. He was profoundly unprovincial; he had a fine and rare quiet appreciation of French poetry; he could write ghost stories, fairy tales, doggerel; he was a supreme dialectician, an amusing parodist, a prince of letter writers, as well as a poet;—perhaps he was above all things a poet. The following translation of Rufinus’ verses to Rhodocleia, sending her a wreath, is a good example of his verse. He has turned an exquisite Greek poem into an exquisite English poem.

To go back to Sydney and the stores. The trouble is I cannot remember either of their names. I had dinner at a restaurant called the Palace Hotel, and after dinner I visited the office of the Sydney “Herald,” where I spent a very pleasant time. I had already been met by two interviewers in the morning, and they asked me whether I was going to write anything about Australia. I said No, that I had no intention of so doing, as I did not believe in writing seriously about a country where one doesn’t make a proper stay. Practically I saw nothing of Australia; but I suppose there is no harm in writing these notes—the mere rough impressions of a fugitive traveller.

Although I was only twelve hours in Sydney, I had occasion to notice the hospitality of the people. What struck me also was the life and gaiety of the place.

The next morning, which was Saturday, I had to leave the liner, which had been my home for the last six weeks, and embark on the Maunganui for Wellington, whither I was bound.

The Maunganui, which belongs to the Union Steamship Company, is a new vessel, and quite extraordinarily comfortable. The voyage from Sydney to Wellington takes from Saturday to Wednesday, but sometimes if the weather is bad it takes longer.

As we steamed out of Sydney, I at last had a view of the famous bay, and it exceeded all my expectations: the colouring is so rich, the lines and shape of the coast are so nobly planned, and the sky and the sea are so intoxicatingly bright, fresh, and dazzling. I am sorry for people who are disappointed in Sydney.