In the meantime, the plank had been raised; the huge paddles had slowly begun to go around, and a stream of foam, white as cream, on either side, marked the track of the steamer down the river. Minnie watched the banks with delight, as they appeared to move faster and faster with the vessel's increasing speed. There was so much to see, so much to wonder at, as every bend of the river brought new objects to view. The child's delight reached its height, when the noble hospital of Greenwich appeared with its stately park rising behind, and at the same time from the deck of a passing steamer, gliding with fairy speed, sounded the air of "Rule Britannia," borne towards them by the fresh breeze. "How happy she is!" thought her mother, looking fondly at the child by her side. "She is like some joyous young creature just beginning the voyage of life, to whom all around seems beautiful, and everything bright ahead. She is troubled by no thought of storm or trial; she rejoices that she is going to a home, and she trusts to a parent's care to provide all things needful on the way. Lord, give me this childlike spirit of trust, and hope, and love, as I journey to the heavenly home, which my dear husband has long since reached." Pleasure seldom lasts long without a check. Shortly before passing the Nore, as evening was coming on, a shower of rain warned the voyagers to seek shelter below. Minnie had not yet seen the place in which two nights were to be passed, and it was with some curiosity that she descended the steep stairway that led to the ladies' cabin. "What a dark, dull room!" she exclaimed, as she entered and looked around; "and how hot and close it feels! I wish that we could stop all night on deck. Why, where are we to sleep?" she added; "not in those little pigeonholes surely! Are twelve or fourteen ladies to be crowded together in a room no bigger than our parlor, and not nearly so nice and high?" "These are our berths," said Mrs. Mayne, with a smile, showing to her daughter a little recess, almost perfectly dark, in which were four "pigeonholes," as Minnie called them, two on each side, one above another, each containing a bed; while in the centre was a space only wide enough to turn round in. "The berths on the right hand are ours. You shall have the one over mine." Minnie laughed at the idea of clambering up to her little nest, though she did not much like its appearance. "And will two other ladies," she asked, "be packed into these tiny berths on the left?" "No doubt, as the steamer is full." "I hope they'll be quiet and pleasant," murmured Minnie, who was quite unaccustomed to be brought into such very close contact with strangers. She had scarcely spoken, when Mrs. Lowe and her Jemima came bustling up to the recess. "What a wretched dark hole it is!" exclaimed the greengrocer's wife, in disgust, as with her dress spreading out like a balloon, she almost entirely blocked up the entrance.