My Unknown Chum

I have a profound respect for the sea as a moral teacher. No man can be tossed about upon it without feeling his impotence and insignificance, and having his heart opened to the companions of his danger as it has never been opened before. The sea brings out the real character of every man; and those who journey over its "deep invisible paths" find themselves intrusting their most sacred confidences to the keeping of comparative strangers. The conventionalities of society cannot thrive in a salt atmosphere; and you shall be delighted to see how frank and agreeable the "world's people" can be when they are caught where the laws of fashion are silent, and what a wholesome neglect of personal appearances prevails among them when that sternest of democrats, Neptune, has placed them where they feel that it would be folly to try to produce an impression. The gentleman of the prize ring, whom Dickens introduces looking with admiration at the stately Mr. Do