At Canton, he took passage in a sailing vessel bound for New York, that being his most direct and least expensive route. He was anxious to return to the United States, because he had been absent over two years, and because of some financial arrangements which he considered it important to make. He felt also that if he should publish a record of his travels in the form of books, the sooner they were issued after his letters had appeared in the “Tribune,” the better for the publishers and for himself. In this undertaking, however, he was much delayed. The ship in which he sailed, passed the Philippine Islands and the coast of Java, and rounding the Cape of Good Hope, stopped for water at the isle of St. Helena. The body of the Emperor Napoleon had been removed to Paris, but Mr. Taylor found it a very interesting and romantic spot. He was as much shocked, however, by the desecration of the spot by the practical herd-keepers, as he was by the profanity of the machine-rhymester who marred the grotto of the poet Camoens at Macao with a doggerel composition. Mr. Taylor felt the absurdity of such profanations, as none but poetical natures can feel them. From St. Helena, the voyage was not unusually eventful, and after one hundred and one days at sea, and with Mr. Taylor nearly that number of days engaged in writing and correcting, they arrived in New York on the 20th of December, 1853. His welcome to New York and to his old home was one of the most pleasant experiences of his life, and he often mentioned it as being as exciting as the event of his first return when he walked into the old homestead in his German walking-suit. CHAPTER XXV. Takes up the Editorial Pen.—Publication of His “Poems of the Orient.”—His Books of Travel.—Lecturing before Lyceums.—Friendship of Richard H. Stoddard.—Private Correspondence.—Love of Fun.—Resolves to Build a Home at Kennett.—Charges of Intemperance.—Preparations for a Third Trip to Europe.—Acquaintance with Thackeray.