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The distance between the ship and the steamer rapidly increased. We stood on the quarter-deck, waving our handkerchiefs, and when the strains of "Yankee Doodle" floated over the waters and distinctly saluted us, we all gave three cheers, and I wept freely, overpowered as I was with mingled feelings of regret and joy. At two o'clock the pilot left us, and thus was broken the last visible living link that bound us to our country.

The voyage to Liverpool has so frequently been described in print, that I shall abstain from entering into details. Abundant material is before me, in the first two of a series of one hundred letters which I furnished while in Europe, as correspondent of the New-York Atlas, but I shall do no more than transcribe or adopt such facts and adventures as will serve to keep up the chain of my history.

In consequence of calms and some adverse winds, we were nineteen days on the passage. Never was there a better ship nor a more admirable Captain. Only a few of the passengers were called upon for the customary sacrifice to Neptune or the fishes -- and, contrary to my expectations, I was one of the party exempted. Good fellowship prevailed, and the time passed with sufficient rapidity, and some jokes.

Our fellow-passengers were chiefly English merchants from Canada. One of the number reckoned himself as A No. 1, and frequently hinted that he was a little too "cute" for any Yankee. He boasted so often of his shrewdness, that a Yankee friend on board and myself resolved to give it a test before we arrived. On the tenth day of our passage, an opportunity offered itself. We were nearly becalmed, and the time hung heavily on our hands. I thought of an old Yankee trick, which I concluded to try on John Bull. So, having contrived the matter with my brother Yankee from New-York, I proceeded to put it in execution. Coming out of my state-room in great apparent pain, from an obdurate tooth, I asked the steward if there was an instrument in the medicine chest for extracting a painful masticator. Being answered in the negative, I inquired of my fellow-passengers what was good for the toothache. My Yankee friend (and confederate) recommended heating tobacco, and holding it to my face. I therefore borrowed a little tobacco, and putting it in a paper of a peculiar color, placed it on the stove to warm. I then retired for a few minutes, during which time the Yankee proposed playing a trick on me by emptying the tobacco, and filling the paper with ashes. The passengers liked the joke, and the Englishman thought it would be very fine, and he at once threw the tobacco in the fire and put ashes in its stead.

I soon appeared, and, with much gravity placed the paper to my face, and commenced walking up and down the cabin, the very picture of misery. The passengers found much difficulty in concealing their mirth. In my pocket I had a paper containing tobacco, and as that paper was of the same color as the one I held to my face, I contrived to change it while I was at the further end of the cabin. Presently, the merry Englishman cried out:

"Mr. Barnum, what have you got in that paper?"

"Tobacco," I replied.

"What will you bet it is tobacco?" said the Englishman.

"Oh, don't bother me," said I; "my tooth pains me sadly; I know it is tobacco, for I put it there myself."

"I'll bet you a dozen of champagne that it is not tobacco," said the Englishman.

"Nonsense," I replied, "I will not bet, for it would not be fair; I know it is tobacco."

"I'll bet you fifty dollars it is not," said John Bull, and he counted ten sovereigns upon the table.

"I'll not bet the money," I replied, "for I tell you I know it is tobacco; I placed it there myself."

"You dare not bet!" he rejoined.

At last, merely to accommodate him, I bet a dozen of champagne. The Englishman jumped with delight, and roared out:

"Open the paper! open the paper!"

The passengers crowded round the table in great glee to see me open the paper, for all but the Yankee thought I was taken in. I quietly opened the paper, and remarked:

"There, I told you it was tobacco -- how foolish you were to suppose it was not -- for I put it there myself!"

The passengers looked blank for a moment -- it was but a moment, and then the laugh turned against the Englishman with redoubled force. I never saw a man look so foolish in my life as he did. The biter was bit. He could not speak for five minutes. At last he called to the steward to bring on the champagne, and turning to my fellow-countryman, he remarked, with most chop-fallen disdain, "It was a contemptible Yankee trick!" Several days elapsed before he recovered his good-humor. At last, however, he laughed as heartily at the joke as any of us, but he bragged no more of his extra shrewdness.

On the eighteenth day out, the cry of "Land ho!" brought us to the deck in great glee. The snow-capped mountains of Wales soon appeared in sight, and in three hours we were safely in the Liverpool docks. A large throng of persons were gathered upon the wharves, and many were anxiously inquiring for Tom Thumb, as it had previously been announced in Liverpool that he would arrive in the Yorkshire. His mother managed to smuggle him on shore without being noticed, for they little thought that he was small enough to be carried in arms, like an infant.