the noises above you; the smells around you; the diversified crowd, of which you are a part; at one moment the heat this crowd creates; at the next, the draught which a window just opened behind your ears lets in on you; the fumes of punch; the snores of the man under the table; the noisy anger of his neighbour, who reviles the attendant sylph; the would-be witticisms of a third, who makes continual amorous overtures to the same overtasked damsel, notwithstanding the publicity of his situation; the loud complaints of the old lady near the door, who cannot obtain the gratuitous kindness of a glass of water; and the baby-soothing lullabies of the young one, who is suckling her infant under your elbow.  These things alike prevent one from reading, sleeping, or thinking.  All one can do is to wait till the long night gradually wears itself away, and reflect that,

Time and the hour run through the longest day [17].

[FOOTNOTE 15:  Of course it will be remembered that this was
written before railways in Ireland had been
constructed. (original footnote by Trollope)]

[FOOTNOTE 16:  vis inertiae—­(Latin) the power of inertia]

[FOOTNOTE 17:  Macbeth, Act I, Sc. 3:  “Come what come may,
Time and the hour runs through the roughest day.”]

I hardly know why a journey in one of these boats should be much more intolerable than travelling either outside or inside a coach; for, either in or on the coach, one has less room for motion, and less opportunity of employment.  I believe the misery of the canal-boat chiefly consists in a pre-conceived and erroneous idea of its capabilities.  One prepares oneself for occupation—­an attempt is made to achieve actual comfort—­and both end in disappointment; the limbs become weary with endeavouring to fix themselves in a position of repose, and the mind is fatigued more by the search after, than the want of, occupation.

Martin, however, made no complaints, and felt no misery.  He made great play at the eternal half-boiled leg of mutton, floating in a bloody sea of grease and gravy, which always comes on the table three hours after the departure from Porto Bello.  He, and others equally gifted with the dura ilia messorum [18], swallowed huge collops [19] of the raw animal, and vast heaps of yellow turnips, till the pity with which a stranger would at first be inclined to contemplate the consumer of such unsavoury food, is transferred to the victim who has to provide the meal at two shillings a head.  Neither love nor drink—­and Martin had, on the previous day, been much troubled with both—­had affected his appetite; and he ate out his money with the true persevering prudence of a Connaught man, who firmly determines not to be done.

[FOOTNOTE 18:  dura ilia messorum—­(Latin) the strong intestines
of reapers—­a quotation from Horace’s Epodes III. 
Trollope was an accomplished Latin scholar and later
wrote a Life of Cicero.  His books are full of
quotations from many Roman writers.]