When “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” had been some four months in the hands of the people, the publishers sent Mrs. Stowe a check for ten thousand dollars! Professor Stowe held this magical piece of paper in his hands and looking helplessly at his wife, said, “Why, Harriet, I never saw so much money in my life!” He had hoped that the book would be successful enough in the financial way to buy for her what she very much needed, a new silk dress. The returns from the sale, however, besides accomplishing that modest result, also brought within reach many comforts hitherto unknown in the house of the professor’s family. More than this, they assured the opportunity for foreign travel and for the beneficial meeting with people in England and elsewhere who sympathized with the cause to which Mrs. Stowe had dedicated her heart. In the spring of 1853, then, we find her starting out for her first sea voyage. This new experience with that “restless, babbling giant,” the ocean, was described in her first letter home in her accustomed merry vein. If you are going to sea, she wrote to her children, you must have everything ready; you must set your house--that is, your stateroom--in order as if you were going to be hanged, for you may be sure that in half an hour after sailing an infinite desperation will seize you in which the grasshopper will be a burden. Her voyage she declared gave her a new sympathy for babies who are rocked at home without so much as a “by your leave”; she thought it no wonder there are so many stupid people in the world! There were moments, however, when she could conquer the nervous horror she always had of that “rude, noisy old servant” of the Lord, and could feel that the ocean was always obedient to His will, and could not carry her beyond His power and love, wherever and to whatever it might bear her. At one time on a later journey she had this faith put to the test when her ship was run into by another, and she found that it did not fail her, but kept her calm and serene throughout the ordeal. When Mrs. Stowe, together with her husband and brother, reached England a great surprise awaited them. She had had no realization of the real significance of having written a book of universal pity and love that would awaken a response in every heart among rich and poor. She was dazed that so many people came to the boat to meet her, that she walked up the wharf through a long lane of kindly, welcoming faces, and that wherever she went in England, and especially in Scotland, her carriage was run after by wild flocks of sympathetic people anxious to catch one glimpse of the author of “Uncle Tom.”