These reflections have dispelled the agitation with which I
began my letter, and I feel my heart glow with an enthusiasm
which elevates me to heaven; for nothing contributes so much to
tranquilise the mind as a steady purpose, -- a point on which the
soul may fix its intellectual eye. This expedition has been the
favourite dream of my early years. I have read with ardour the
accounts of the various voyages which have been made in the
prospect of arriving at the North Pacific Ocean through the seas
which surround the pole. You may remember that a history of all
the voyages made for purposes of discovery composed the whole of
our good uncle Thomas's library. My education was neglected, yet
I was passionately fond of reading. These volumes were my study
day and night, and my familiarity with them increased that
regret which I had felt, as a child, on learning that my
father's dying injunction had forbidden my uncle to allow me to
embark in a seafaring life.
These visions faded when I perused, for the first time, those
poets whose effusions entranced my soul, and lifted it to
heaven.
I also became a poet, and for one year lived in a Paradise of
my own creation; I imagined that I also might obtain a niche in
the temple where the names of Homer and Shakespeare are
consecrated. You are well acquainted with my failure, and how
heavily I bore the disappointment. But just at that time I
inherited the fortune of my cousin, and my thoughts were turned
into the channel of their earlier bent.