NOTICE. FORMERLY, there used to be a work enjoying some degree of reputation, entitled A History of Shipwrecks and Disasters at Sea; but that collection, though doubtless the best of its kind, always appeared to us as of too gloomy and disheartening a character. The sea displays many scenes besides those of suffering. Its direful storms produce incalculable misery; but in its more frequent periods of calm, breeze, and sunshine, it is the theatre of cheerful existence, and the means of effecting the most useful purposes. The traffic which it facilitates; the intercourse of nation with nation and friend with friend across its vast expanse; the changeful feelings of the voyaging party, shut up within a little space, and for the time so mutually dependent; the ever-varying physical circumstances of the ocean itself, yielding to every breath of wind, and everywhere teeming with varied life-these suggest but a few of the considerations connected with the sea, which may be supposed to furnish subjects for literary notice. Under this impression, the present selection of pieces was made for the PEOPLE'S EDITIONS,' published many years ago, and is now |