Mark Seaworth | Page 3

wills it,
as those who are sleeping on beds of down within palace walls; because,
remember, reader, that He is all-powerful, and He is everywhere. Trust
in Him; never despond; pray to Him for help at all times--in times of
peace and prosperity, in times of danger and difficulty; and oh! believe
that most assuredly He will help and protect you in the way He knows
is best for your eternal happiness.
This is the lesson I would teach; for this is the lesson I have learned by
means of all the difficulties and dangers I have undergone during the
scenes of wild and extraordinary adventure which I have encountered
in my course through life. Often and often, had I not been convinced of
this great truth, I should have yielded to despair; and the longer I have
lived, and the more dangers I have passed through, the more firmly
convinced have I become of it. Often have I felt my own utter
helplessness--the impossibility that the strength of man could avail
me--when standing, it seemed, on the very brink of destruction; and in

a way beyond all calculation, I have found myself rescued and placed
in safety. It was for this reason that I have drawn the picture which I
have exhibited to you. Ungrateful indeed should I be, and negligent of
my bounden duty, did I not do my utmost to teach the lesson I have
learned from the merciful protection so often afforded me; for know
that I was one of those helpless infants! and the picture before us shows
the first scene in my life, of which I have any record; and this is the
moral I would inculcate--"That God is everywhere."
CHAPTER TWO.
A large ship was floating on the ocean. I use the term floating, for she
could scarcely be said to be doing anything else, as she did not seem to
be moving in the slightest degree through the water. Some straw and
chips of wood, which had been thrown overboard, continued hour after
hour alongside. She was, however, moving; but it was round and round,
though very slowly indeed, as a glance at the compass would have
shown. The sea was as smooth as glass, for there was not a breath of air
to ruffle it; there was, in fact, a perfect calm.
The ship was a first-class Indiaman, on her outward voyage to the
far-famed land of the East; and she belonged to that body of merchant
princes, the East India Company. In appearance she was not altogether
unlike a frigate with her long tier of guns, her lofty masts, her wide
spread of canvas, and her numerous crew; but her decks were far more
encumbered than those of a man-of-war, and her hold was full of rich
merchandise, and the baggage of the numerous passengers who
occupied her cabins. Her sails, for the present, however, were of no use;
so, having nothing else to do, for the sole purpose, it would seem, of
annoying the most sensitive portion of the human beings on board, they
continued, with most persevering diligence, flapping against the masts,
while the ship rolled lazily from side to side. The decks presented the
appearance of a little world shut out from the rest of mankind; for all
grades, and all professions and trades, were to be found on board. On
the high poop deck, under an awning spread over it to shelter them
from the burning rays of the sun, were collected the aristocratical
portion of the community. There were there to be found ladies and

gentlemen, the sedate matron, and the blooming girl just reaching
womanhood, the young wife and the joyous child; there were lawyers
and soldiers, sailors and merchants, clergymen and doctors, some of
them holding high rank in their respective professions. The captain, of
course, was king, and his mates were his ministers; but, like the rest, he
was bound by laws which he dared not infringe, even had he desired to
have done so.
On the deck below were seen craftsmen of all sorts, occupied in their
respective callings. Carpenters hard at work with plane and saw;
blacksmiths with bellows and anvil; tailors and cobblers, barbers and
washerwomen, painters and armourers, rope-makers and butchers, and
several others, besides the seamen engaged in the multifarious duties in
which officers know well how to employ them. Among the crew were
seen representatives of each quarter of the Old World. There were
Malays and other Asiatics, and the dark-skinned sons of Africa,
mingled among the hardy seamen of Britain, each speaking a different
jargon, but all taught by strict discipline to act in unison.
Besides the human beings, there were cattle and sheep destined for the
butcher's knife--cows to afford milk to the lady passengers, the