The longest delay during the passage is at Oban, but then we had dinner there, which helped to kill the time in a pleasant way. The _Clansman_ had received a quantity of cargo at Tobermory, at Loch Aline a flock of sheep were driven on board, goods were taken in plentifully at other places in the Sound at which we touched, and when we had received all the stuffs waiting for us at Oban, the vessel was heavily laden. The entire steerage deck was a bellowing and bleating mass of black cattle and sheep, each "parcel" divided from the other by temporary barriers. The space amidships was a chaos of barrels and trunks and bales of one kind or another, and amongst these the steerage passengers were forced to dispose themselves. Great piles of wooden boxes containing herring were laid along the cabin deck, so that if a man were disposed to walk about it behoved him to take care of his footsteps. But who cared! We were away from Oban now, the wind was light, the sun setting behind us, and the bell ringing for tea. It was the last meal we were to have together, and through some consciousness of this the ice of reserve seemed to melt, and the passengers to draw closer to each other. The Hebridean clergymen unbent; the handsome earl chatted to his neighbours as if his forehead had never known the golden clasp of the coronet; the sporting men stalked their stags over again; the members of Parliament discussed every subject except the affairs of the nation; the rich brewer joked; the merchants from Stornoway laughed immoderately; while the cattle-dealers listened with awe. Tea was prolonged after this pleasant fashion, and then, while the Stornoway merchants and the cattle-dealers solaced themselves with a tumbler of punch, the majority of the other passengers went up stairs to the hurricane deck to smoke. What a boon is tobacco to the modern Englishman! It stands in place of wife, child, profession, and the interchange of ideas. With a pipe in your mouth indifference to your neighbour is no longer churlish, and silent rumination becomes the most excellent companionship. The English were never very great talkers, but since Sir Walter Raleigh introduced the Virginian weed they have talked less than ever. Smoking parliaments are always silent--and as in silence there is wisdom, they are perhaps more effective than the talking ones. Mr Carlyle admired those still smoke-wreathed Prussian assemblies of Frederick's, and I am astonished that he does not advocate the use of the weed in our English Witenagemote. Slowly the night fell around the smokers, the stars came out in the soft sky, as the air grew chill, and one by one they went below. Then there was more toddy-drinking, some playing at chess, one or two attempts at letter-writing, and at eleven o'clock the waiters cleared the tables, and began to transform the saloon into a large sleeping apartment. [Sidenote: The Mull of Cantyre.]