The boy's vague dream of foreign adventure had passed away; my purpose was of a tamer and more practical cast; it was resolved to this problem: "How could I travel abroad and pay my expenses?"
Evidently no money could be made by home correspondence. The new order of journals had no charity for fine moral descriptions of church steeples, ruined castles, and picture galleries; I knew too little of foreign politics to give the Republic its semi-weekly "sensation;" and exchange was too high at the depreciated value of currency to yield me even a tolerable reward. But might I not reverse the policy of the peripatetics, and, instead of turning my European experiences into American gold, make my knowledge of America a bill of credit for England?
What capital had I for this essay? I was twenty-one years of age; the last three years of my minority had been passed among the newspapers; I knew indifferently well the distribution of parties, the theory of the Government, the personalities of public men, the causes of the great civil strife. And I had mounted to my saddle in the beginning of the war, and followed the armies of McClellan and Pope over their sanguinary battle-fields. The possibility thrilled me like a novel discovery, that the Old World might be willing to hear of the New, as I could depict it, fresh from the theatre of action. At great expense foreign correspondents had been sent to our shores, whose ignorance and confidence had led them into egregious blunders; for their travelling outlay merely, I would have guaranteed thrice the information, and my sanguine conceit half persuaded me that I could present it as acceptably. I did not wait to ponder upon this suggestion. The guns of the second action of Bull Run growled a farewell to me as I resigned my horse and equipments to a successor. With a trifle of money, I took passage on a steamer, and landed at Liverpool on the first of October, 1862.
Among my acquaintances upon the ship was a semi-literary adventurer from New England. I surmised that his funds were not more considerable than my own; and indeed, when he comprehended my plans, he confessed as much, and proposed to join enterprises with me.
"Did you ever make a public lecture?" he asked.