CHAPTER VI 1.

PASSAGE TO JAVA,

HAVING received an invitation from Capt. Druminond, to accompany him in the H. C. ship Castle Huntley, to Java, where he understood I was going, we left Canton at midnight of December 28th, and proceeded in a large “chop boat” to the ship, lying below the second bar. The Castle Huntley, though rather inferior in dimensions to some of the vessels in the same service, exceeds thirteen hundred tons in burden, carries twenty-six guns, and has a crew of one hundred and forty men. Every ship of this kind affords scope for the most zealous chaplain ; and if, as in the present instance, favored with the advice, the co-operation, and the prayers of the commander, the prospect of success is highly animating. Whenever the weather admitted, we had divine service every Sabbath morning, on deck, and every evening in the cuddy. A part of almost every day was spent on the gun deck, among the crew, visiting the sick, instructing the ignorant, and exhorting all “to repent and be lieve."

Having never been brought in such constant contact with a large number of sailors, I had an excellent

opportunity of testing and correcting my previous opinions, respecting the best mode of profitable intercourse with them on ship board.

A sailor, as all the world knows, is a strange being. Bluntness is one characteristic, and bluntness, mingled with an earnest seriousness, must be employed to meet it. No time need be spent in any conversation preliminary to the subject of personal religion. It generally leads to such remarks or complaints from them, as will tend to defeat your object, rather than promote it.

Disrespect, where there is no restraint upon them, and frequently a shocking oath, or a loud avowal of their contempt of your presence and purpose, are at first employed by a few of the more hardy spirits, to show to their shipmates their manly superiority to religious scruples--and probably to prevent you from intruding into their retirement, or disturbing their consciences. This, however, is seldom repeated, if the case be properly managed at the time.. Let them see that you are dauntless--that all such obstacles, instead of subduing, only animate you—instead of irritating, only soften your spirit into the deeper compassionthat you regard their salvation of infinite importance, and could weep at the enormity of their crimes, and the imminence of their danger, and you will generally find these bravadoes, in future, among the most deferential and docile. If the challange or oath is as evidently intended for your ears, as for their companions, " "rebuke them before all," showing at the same time, that you have no wish to retaliate, or simply to put them

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to shame; but to expose the exceeding guilt and madness of such unprovoked rebellion against God.

If you can make a sailor feel that his usual wickedness and indifference to duty can proceed from nothing but ignorance, as wilful as it is profound, and that you have no secular object in view in exhorting or instructing him, you have obtained a claim upon his ear, and a passport to his heart. When these first difficulties, which are the most appalling to those unaccustomed to exertion among seamen, are mastered, the peculiarities of cases, must, as on shore, indicate their own treatment.

Probably no unvarying plan of systematic effort on ship-board can be adopted. This must depend upon the dispositions of the oflicers, the regulations of the vessel, and, in a measure, the inclinations of the men. Opportunities for private conversation may always be found, or created, and tracts and small practical works may be distributed, under almost all circumstances. Every chaplain to seamen-every missionary to the heathen--every traveling Christian-should carry a lending library with them.

For the greatest benefit of this class of men, we must look to those who labor among them in harbor. As a sailor has no circumspection, no forecast, others should exercise these principles for him. The crimps have long availed themselves of these characteristie defects, and the consequences are too well known to be detailed. The boarding systems at home should be broken up--of course through the effect of counteraction. There must be such a desperate invasion upon the usurped province of every crimp, as to leave him

no means of subsistence, unless he abandons his inhuman traffic in the souls and bodies of his victims.

The immense good which may and must result from the conversion of this class of men, is best appreciated by those who have resided in foreign lands. Sailors generally prove a most serious detriment to all missionary efforts, and should they become subjects of religion themselves, instead of "scattering firebrands, arrows and death," upon every heathen shore where they touch, they would help to sow " the seed of eternal life," even where missionaries have never traveled.

Among the crew, was a young man from New York, whom the captain pointed out as quite superior in intellect to his shipmates, but who, on account of the most glaring misconduct; had been publicly flogged. I had frequent opportunities of conversing with him, and found him in a frame of mind, which appeared favorable to religious impressions. He desired to accompany me in any capacity, but I did not feel myself at liberty to take him, neither should I have deemed the step prudent under any circumstances, with the uncertain prospect before me. The custom of sending boys of respectability to sea, or of allowing them to follow their own roving dispositions, and make a trial of this mode of life, is common, both in parts America and Great Britain.

Having heard the opinion of many of different nations, and in all the capacities of the merchant service, the writer feels the more anxious to echo to the young and uninitiated, the voice of experience on this subject. Though the topic has been one of frequent

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conversation, he has met with none accustomed to good society, who, if they were compelled to continue this life, did not deplore the necessity which bound them to it, and dissuade their childen and others from entering upon it as a matter of choice.

If the acquisition of wealth, or a simple livelihood be the object, probably none of the ordinary pursuits of life could prove less advantageous. The wages, if not inadequate to current expenses, are most scantily proportioned to them, and even with the prospect of a speedy advancement, which few enjoy, and still fewer realize, the result is the same. The highest station, to a man of family, affords a bare subsistence, and the liberty of a limited trade, generally adds but very little to the income. This, too, must be connected with the necessity of being absent from his family more than three fourths of his time, deprived of the comforts and privileges of shore, and exposed to daily trials, of which landsmen have no conception.

The fact that so few captains of ships amass fortunes, and the still more embarrassing truth to which allusion has been made, that scarcely any continue this line of life from choice, are sufficient to control the judgments of all who are selecting their worldly occupations, and have the advantages of the wide continent of America before them.

Sometimes a seaman's birth has been selected for a voyage or two, to improve the morals of the dissipated. Those who re lawless on land, are sent to sea for salutary discipline; but here again, no plan could be more subversive of its end. The mixed society, composed generally of the lowest class of men, gathered