A SAILING vessel was on her homeward voyage from the West Indies, when the following interesting incidents, which are described by an eyewitness, occurred. It happened, said the writer, that as we approached the end of our voyage, the weather became squally, and we had occasionally a good deal of sea going, which made things very uncomfortable on board. A sailor, who had behaved very ill at the outset of the voyage, and whom the men had declined keeping company with, was shortly after seized with a fever; and although it had been in some measure subdued, yet the poor fellow was in a very dangerous state. He had been a very bad man, and now that he was apparently drawing near to death, he was desirous that some care might be shown him in regard to his soul. The captain and crew were very indifferent upon the subject; and I had been so ill that I was scarcely able even to get out of my berth. There happened, however, to be a little boy on board, who went among the sailors by the nickname of “Pious Jack;” or what was, perhaps, equally to his honor, or at least to the honor of the philanthropist from whom he derived it (though intended for a deeper mark of contempt), they used to call him Jack Raikes, from the circumstance of his having been educated in one of the Sunday Schools of Robert Raikes at Gloucester, of which city the boy, John Pelham, was a native. Jack, however, cared very little for the sneers and scoffs of the seamen; and the meekness, patience, and temper, with which he endured the jeers of many on board, often gave me occasion to say— “Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings Thou hast ordained strength, that Thou mightest still the enemy.”
When Williams, the poor sailor, was dying, and indeed, all the time he had been ill, nobody had shown him any kindness except little Jack, and a negro woman who was on board, the attendant of a child, a Creole of the West Indies, whom she was bringing over to some relations in England. This woman, Cleopatra by name, but who was always called Cleo, ministered to the temporal wants of the dying seaman, nursing him with great tenderness, preparing with her own hands whatever she thought would be likely to tempt his sickly appetite.
The little Creole whom Cleo had in charge was a sweet child, about four years of age, or younger. I saw her very seldom, for she generally amused herself on deck, when the weather would permit, playing with a pet kid which had been spared for her sake—which followed her wherever she went, and which she had taught to go down and up the companion ladder; and Cleo brought it in her arms into my cabin, almost every morning, when she came to ask me how I did.
This excellent negress was kindly attentive to the sick and young, for we had two or three of both on board; and though she knew but little of the deep things of God, yet she possessed much sympathy for the soul of the dying man. She could not read herself, but she knew that the Bible taught the way to heaven; and she sat with devout attention, listening to every word which the dear boy Jack read from that holy book, not only from day to day, but whenever he could persuade Williams to hearken to it; and in the event that soon after followed, I have much reason to hope, his care for his poor messmate was abundantly blessed, both to the seaman, and to this interesting daughter of the despised posterity of Ham.
Things had gone on in this way for some time, when one day Jack came into my cabin, his faced bathed in tears, a look of horror in his countenance, his whole frame trembling with agitation, and himself unable to speak: I thought from his appearance that poor Williams was dead, and that, dying, he had left poor Jack no “hope in his death.”
“What’s the matter, Jack?” I said starting up on my elbow in bed. “What has happened? Williams—is he dead?”
“Dear sir,” said the boy, regardless of my question, “Williams—poor Williams! he is in agony of soul; he says he is lost—that he is a ruined sinner—that God will cast him into that place—where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth!—Oh! That shall I say to him?”
“Dearest boy,” I said; “do not afflict thine own soul so bitterly. It is well that Williams feels all this—take it, my child, as a token for good from the hand of thy Heavenly Father, who doubtless has not been unmindful of thy many prayers and labors of love towards this trembling penitent. Go to him again; tell him that God is indeed, as he believes Him to be, a just God, who will by no means clear the guilty without an atonement: tell him to trust in the blood of that atonement already made for the sins of many; tell him God can be just, even while He pardons all his sins, if he throws himself upon His mercy in Christ Jesus. Say to him, it is not too late to believe—neither is it too late for God to have mercy; the Lord delighteth in mercy. Oh! say to him, God waiteth to be gracious.”
“Sir,” replied Jack, “I have told him all this already, but he says he cannot believe it. I have told him the history of the thief on the cross—of the lost sheep—and all the parables about God’s love to sinners—and how Christ came into the world on purpose to save sinners, even the chief. But he says, he cannot believe it.”
I rose with difficulty, and having dressed myself, found my way into the place where Williams was sitting up in his hammock, his face pale and ghastly, his eyes sunk in his head, and his bosom laboring with the heavy respiration of death. The whole circumstances of the scene will not easily be forgotten.
Jack and Cleo were both on their knees beside his berth.
“Open Thine eye of mercy, O most gracious God,” said the boy speaking, I suppose, from memory, or perhaps out of the abundance of his own heart, “Open Thine eye of mercy upon this dying man, who most earnestly desireth pardon and forgiveness.”
“Oh! earnestly,” exclaimed the wretched man, with a voice so full of the bitterness of death, that it sent back the blood in a cold shiver to my heart.
The boy here paused again, and looked with an eye of unutterable supplication upon Williams, but Williams replied only with a look of inexpressible horror, too dreadful even to be thought upon.
“For the sake of Christ,” resumed the little supplicant, (who knew not that I had entered,) “for the sake of Christ, who put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself, show Thy pity on Harry Williams.”
“He has no hope, O Lord, but in Thy mercy! Oh, visit him with Thy salvation!”
“I have no hope,” at last exclaimed the man, wringing his uplifted hands with an expression of despair, “I have no hope!”
“Oh look down from the height of Thy sanctuary, and hear the groaning of this poor prisoner, and loose him who seemeth nigh unto death!”
And Williams, softened by their affectionate sympathy, and doubtless also by the power of that Word which is both spirit and fife, melted into tenderness, and, falling back on his pillow, shed a torrent of tears.
These tears, the first that had moistened his burning brain since the commencement of his sickness, evidently brought relief to his over-burdened spirit.
I saw him not again for many days after this, my own indisposition having increased inconsequence of leaving my bed; but I heard of him daily, and indeed many times a day, both from Jack and the negro woman, and each brought me every day accounts more pleasing. Every moment the boy could spare from the duties of his station on board was occupied in reading the Scriptures to Williams—though his soul’s health was evidently on the increase, his body was hourly waxing weaker and weaker. I told Jack that I wished to see Williams once more, and being now considerably better myself, I would come and visit him next day. Cleo, however, said that she thought Williams now too near his end for me to delay my visit till tomorrow; so hearing this, I arose in the evening and went again to his berth.
The horror so strongly marked in his every feature the first time I saw him had dwelt upon my mind, and on entering the little place where he was lying in his cot, I had, a tremulous sort of dread at the idea of looking on him again. But how great was my surprise, when I beheld in poor—no, in happy Williams, a countenance full of the most touching complacency, that one would have thought that death, which was evidently upon the very threshold, was the object, not of fear, but of long-desired approach. He had, moreover, suffered much in the interval between my former visit and this, and even that very morning, from many doubts and fears; now, however, they seemed to have been all subdued; and he said to me, with the triumph of one deeply conscious to whom the glory was due, “I am a conqueror through Him that loved me! Oh! that wonderful love!”
I spoke to him some time of his state, and of the grounds on which he built his hope, and was much satisfied with all he said in reply. Every word the boy now uttered was as much a source of joy to Williams as it had formerly been prolific only of horror. He said to him two or three times that night, referring to the struggle he had had in the morning, “It is calm now, Jack—all calm—is this peace?”
“Yes,” replied he, “I trust it is peace—the peace of God, which the Bible saith passeth understanding.”
“Who hath given me this peace?” said Williams, as if he delighted in hearing the ascription of praise to his divine Redeemer. “Who hath given me this peace?”
“Christ,” said the boy, “Christ is our peace; He hath made peace for us.”
“Yes,” answered Williams, “by the blood of His cross!”
Well, thought I, might Williams say, his little instructor had taught him two wonderful things— “the knowledge of a love that passeth knowledge, and the feelings of a peace that passeth, understanding!”
I lay awake all that night, communing with my own heart upon my bed, and meditating on the things I had seen and heard in poor Harry’s berth. No sound disturbed the deep repose of all on board, except the man at the helm, as he pattered over my head, steering us through the mighty waters, and chanting from time to time some seaman’s doleful ditty. It was in the midst of this calm, that the spirit of Harry Williams winged its flight aloft; and the next day but one his body was committed to the mighty deep.
The poor boy, on this occasion, seemed to feel, as if for the first time, that his friend and pupil was indeed no more. But when he heard the heavy plunge of the corpse in the water—when the waves with a gurgling sound closed over the body, and shut out forever all that remained of dear Harry Williams, the boy, unable any longer to control the violence of his feelings, uttered a piercing cry—and so infectious is unfeigned sorrow, his grief seemed to find its way to the hearts of most of those who were present and many a hardened tar, whose iron countenance gave no indications of a heart within, felt that day his cheek bedewed with tears.
I could but look upon the whole circumstances of this day’s scene, as a kind of merciful and providential preparation for what followed; for, three days after the time of which I am speaking, drawing nearer and neared to our desired haven, and being not far from the Land’s End, there sprung up such a gale of wind from the W.S.W. that we missed the port in the channel for which we were bound, and making for the Downs; expected to have come to anchor there; but the wind shifting, and continuing more boisterous than at the first, we knew not well where we were. It would be in vain for me to attempt to describe the feelings of those on board; suffice it to say, that the moment of danger is not the best time for anyone to seek peace with God. Now, indeed, is always an accepted time, and God forbid that I should dare to limit the mercy that is measureless; but they who have neglected the great salvation in the day of sunshine and calm,: come with a load of aggravated provocations before God, when they draw near to Him only in the whirlwind and the storm.
The wind being now somewhat abated, we hoped in the course of the fourth day from our leaving the Channel to make the Firth of F—, and this, through the mercy of God, we attained. For in the afternoon of the 25th of March, we came to soundings, and the captain ordered out two anchors.
But oh! we should never be unthankful for small mercies; and these we had surely accounted small, for our ingratitude was visited by severer rebuke than we had ever anticipated, even in the most perilous moments hitherto. The storm, which during the last two or three hours had subsided into a sudden calm, followed only by the mountainous swelling of the sea, burst out again towards sunset with tremendous and redoubled fury, and, driving, us from our moorings, carried us among the islands of the Firth, where at half-past eleven o’clock, in the absence of moon and stars, and amidst cries of “Breakers ahead!” we struck upon a sunken rock, the main-mast coming down with a crash like the wreck of nature.
As the flood tide set in, the breakers on the rock became more and more tremendous. The boat was hoisted out; the shore, however, presented, in my opinion, no hope whatever of safety, for it was one unbroken reef of rocks and shelving stones, on which the sea was dashing with a noise like thunder, and a spray that went up, as it were, to the heavens. I, therefore, determined to abide by the wreck; and seeing I could but die, I resolved, while I had life, to leave no means of self-preservation unimproved; so, lashing myself to a spar, I silently watched the embarkation of Cleo and her child, dear Jack, and some others of the sailors, in the boat. With much difficulty the men were enabled to set a little bit of sail, and made for the shore in the presence of hundreds of spectators, who, collected from the various villages, were looking with anguish upon our miserable situation. When they put off from the wreck they went pretty well for about a quarter of a mile or so; the sail kept them buoyant, and the boat standing with her, head against the waves. But while we were beginning to watch with inexpressible anxiety as she drew nearer and nearer the surf, a tremendous squall involved them all in darkness, and torrents of rain quite shut them out from our view. But oh! how shall I relate what followed!—the sky cleared almost as suddenly as it was overcast—the squall subsided, the sun shone out,—we looked, and looked again till our eyeballs were almost bursting from their sockets; we strained our vision again to look; and the cry, “Where’s the boat? where’s the boat!” the shriek from the spectators on the cliffs, and the groans from my fellow-sufferers on the wreck, came at once with a louder and more fearful sweep than even the wildest ravings of the tempest. Again it returned, in one simultaneous burst of anguish. The sea indeed answered the demand, and gave up the boat, but she gave not up the dead; the former appeared driven, with her keel above the waters, but her interesting freight was gone.
Oh the horrors of that moment!—And yet, amid all its horrors, while I clung, shivering, to the shrouds of the vessel, expecting every moment to be swallowed up by the merciless sea, I felt, as it were, a smile pass over my lips and eyes, like a beam of light kindled by some invisible, some supernatural object, is I followed in spirit the sailor boy, and beheld him, with his ransomed companions, enter into the joy of his Lord.
The wreck, contrary to all human calculation, continued to hold together till next morning; when, the storm having been succeeded by a calm, that came smiling, as it were, at the ruin its predecessor had accomplished, my fellow-sufferers and myself were brought, by the kind care of the fishermen aid peasants on the coast, safe to land.
When I got to land, I went to bed in a little cottage, whose generous owner hospitably opened her door to receive me. I was faint and exhausted; and having been long ill before, I hardly expected to survive at all: but the Lord giveth strength equal to our day.
In the evening, being refreshed by some hours of sleep, I arose, and went to view the bodies of those who had been washed ashore. On the low but decent bed of the little village ale house, Cleo and her “Massa’s child” were lying. They were clasped together in one inseparable embrace, the child’s head reposing on the bosom of her nurse—and the swarthy arms of Cleo were locked around her little darling. Poor Jack!—less honored, but surely not less worthy of honor, was laid out on a sheet on the floor, a blue checkered shirt his only shroud! His countenance wore a sweet and heavenly expression; and stooping down I robbed his ???????
Note: We apologize. Our copy of this book is missing the final three pages and we have been unable to locate another copy.