Ah! that was the thing. Nobody would mind it, except to look up with that rude stare which I had already learned to dread; and if there _should_ be any trouble about finding a vacant seat—oh, it would be _too_ much! An ounce more of mortification, and I should jump into the river. I was pretty hungry, but supper was nothing in comparison, and I retreated to the deck. By and by, the passengers returned; and by this time I had become sufficiently composed to watch others instead of thinking all the time of myself. Men were sitting, and women standing all about the deck, engaged in arguments which I found partook not a little of the tone and manner which characterized most of the contentions of last autumn. There is less of courtesy; men are more bitter and vituperative in an argument on politics than on any other subject, for the reason that they have not merely that one proposition to defend, but pride of party to support; they are not holding an argument with one man simply to establish a truth, but they are opposing a party which it is conducive to their interest—whether right or not, they _think so_—to put down. Precisely so was it in this case; though a few of the more magnanimous among men, or a few, tired of “making themselves slaves to keep their wives and daughters on a throne,” as somebody has it, might not have been annoyed by the Great Reform, yet the generality felt the party-spirit strong within them, and a theory did not gain any thing in their eyes by being broached by a woman. I remembered that in former days women were always the winners in a controversy; though sometimes there was a biting of lips, and a forcing of smiles, and bows, to let it be so; but now it was exactly the reverse. Perhaps you will think the cause of truth gained by the change. No such thing. There was no more impartiality than before. The volubility of the women tried hard to match itself against the stentorian voices of the men, and sometimes succeeded; the former were gainers in the light-artillery of wit, but the latter invariably came in with a heavy cannonade of _put-down-ism_, which would never have been attempted even by a stage-driver, in such a presence, under the _old régime_. While I was watching these doings, and wondering what would become of myself in this new state of things, we were all of us startled by a sudden bustle in another part of the boat—loud, angry voices in altercation, accompanied by blows. The confusion lasted but a moment, and I saw the combatants separated—a very pretty, spirited woman, and a fat elderly gentleman, who looked as though he might, in general, be quite temperate in the matter of treating himself to a fit of anger. But this time he had been provoked beyond endurance, by taunts that would have roused the good old Doubter, and had resorted to _caning_. The lady did not carry a _cane_, but she used the sharp point of her _parasol_ to very good purpose, until the spectators interfered, and the combatants