A FATAL VOYAGE. covering on them when they were flogged. The Lascars looked on crouchingly. The second mate having died, and the chief mate being at one time delirious, the apprentices had to do the work of the men; and the captain, in his fits of wanton brutality, used occasionally to kick the boys away from the wheel when it was their turn to be relieved. Several of the apprentices were taken ill during the voyage, and at such times they attended upon each other as well as they could. The apprentice Lee was invalided, and left at Hobart Town. Millard had the fever several times. Mansbridge also caught the fever, and was ill for a fortnight. He had medicine only twice during his illness, for the doctor was laid up. Once the Captain came half drunk to Mansbridge and brought him some medicine, and the boy once afterwards waded up to his knees in water (for it was during a heavy gale) to the doctor's room to get more. While he was ill, fierce and ugly-looking rats came and bit his toes, but he shook them off. John Paul, another apprentice, died miserably, three days after leaving Hobart Town. Three days before he died he was insensible; he scarcely ever spoke during his illness, but moaned in agony. Two of his fellow apprentices attended on him. The Captain afterwards sold the poor fellow's clothes, and raffled away his watch. His mother-the wife of a respectable yeoman in the New Forest-visited the "Lady Montague" as soon as she arrived home, to hear what tidings she could of her son. Orscroft, the Brighton youth, deserted at Callao, and it is not known in Southampton what became of him. The It has been already said that sickness overtook the Chinese emigrants soon after they left Cumsingmoon, and which sickness extended to the crew, both Lascar and English. sickness amongst the Chinese was increased by the supercargo refusing them opium, to which they had been accustomed. It was thought that he refused the drug because he could make a high price of it amongst the Chinese who work on the Peruvian guano islands. But the sickness amongst the Chinese and Lascars was aggravated by the death of the doctor, and, more than all, by the bad quality of the provisions. The fish and water on board became putrid. Better fish and water were taken on board at Hobart Town, but in insufficient quantities. The Chinese would not touch their dead fellow countrymen, whose faces were horribly mutilated by rats; and the task of throwing the dead bodies overboard devolved on the apprentices. Five of the Chinamen, in fits of madness and despair, jumped A FATAL VOYAGE. overboard. They appeared to be expert swimmers and divers One of them slid into the water by a rope's end, and was seen slily concealing his head under water to prevent being seen and taken on board again. When nearly drowned, he was secured, and he recovered after some difficulty. One was swimming near the ship, and a boat was sent after him, but he kept diving, to prevent being saved, and at last appeared no more. The last they saw of another was as he was swimming away from the ship, about two miles astern, apparently making for land, which loomed a long way in the distance. This was in the Pacific Ocean. Twice the Chinese showed a spirit of insubordination. The Indian, Seraing, flogged a Lascar during the voyage, who implored, in the Chinese language, the interference of the emigrants; and the latter were about to interfere, but they desisted, at the request of the supercargo, who went and spoke to them. When the ship arrived off Callao, she was put in quarantine. Some Chinese, who appear to have been trepanned to Peru, got into communication with their countrymen of the "Lady Montague;" and, as it appears, informed them of the deception that had been practised on them. While in quarantine, also, the emigrants were put ashore on the island of St. Lorenzo, for the benefit of their health, and some English man-of-war's-men cut off their tails in a frolic. All this raised a spirit of frenzy and mutiny amongst them; but they were soon pacified. They seemed to be reconciled to anything in order to leave the detested ship. When the "Lady Montague" returned to Hong Kong, which was twelve months after she left Cumsingmoon, Captain Smith was superseded by a Captain Le Shaw, sent from England by the owners. After Smith was superseded, he attempted to bring ashore a large box of money, but was prevented by the new Captain. The "Lady Montague," after calling at Singapore and Madras, to take in sugar and buffalo horns, proceeded to the Cape of Good Hope on her way to England. The new Captain turned out a bad man and a drunkard, and did not replenish his ship at the Cape and at St. Helena with sufficient stores, so that the crew were placed on short allowance. After leaving, the latter place they obtained some provisions from a passing ship, but it was not enough, and the crew, including Mansbridge and Millard, suffered great privations. At length the "Lady Montague" reached the Cove of Cork, after an absence of more than four years, A FATAL VOYAGE. and the new Captain afterwards was dismissed for his misconduct. The above account is an unexaggerated statement, taken from the lips of William Charles Mansbridge, one of the unfortunate apprentice boys, whose father declares that it corresponds with what the boy confessed to him, in all truth and sincerity, when he first arrived in this country, and also with what he stated to the official who came from London to Southampton to take his deposition; and it is borne out by what young Millard told his uncle, a retired Southampton tradesman, who took great interest in his nephew, and even accompanied him some distance in the "Lady Montague" when she first left Southampton Water. Mansbridge never talks about his sufferings only when questioned. He appears uncontaminated by any vice, is short of stature, but looks every inch a sailor, and retains his unconquerable love of the sea. The agony the parents of the apprentice boys suffered during four years no pen can describe. They used to meet to condole with each other. All they knew was, that their children were thousands of miles away, suffering privations and cruelties from a man who, the owners of the "Lady Montague" declared, had committed an act of piracy, and of whose movements and whereabouts they knew no more than the parents themselves. A few weeks ago, Mrs. Mansbridge heard a knock at her shop door, and, looking through a small window from an inner room, saw a miserable-looking youth standing outside. "Ah, dear me!" she sighed; and moving slowly into the shop, said to herself, "I must give him something, I suppose, for one don't know what one's own may want." In a minute afterwards she embraced her long absent son. The sad story of the Lady Montague is pregnant with reflection. Here are five youths, fired with the noble passion for the sea, taken from happy homes and exposed for years to galling tyranny. Two sink under it, another flings himself on an inhospitable coast rather than endure it, and the other two would have deserted to the same shore if it had been possible. But there are reflections more painful than this, for they more deeply affect the national character. Every now and then we hear of some frightful tragedy in the Chinese seas. Chinese passengers barbarously murdering the English crews of ships which are conveying them. Perhaps the tale of the Lady Montague reveals the secret of some of these atrocities. At Cumsingmoon there may be schemes concocted not inferior in A FATAL VOYAGE. atrocity to those contrived on the coast of Africa Poor ignorant Chinese have been evidently decoyed on board a British ship there, under the belief that they were going to California for gold, and have been then doomed to virtual slavery for years amidst the poisonous and eternal s ench of the Peruvian guano beds. There may be other men besides the miscreant Smith who, actuated by the demoniac spirit of the old buccaneers, may be capable of perpetrating the most disgusting brutality and the most infernal wickedness. We have given the above narrative as we found it in the public papers. On reading it we felt ashamed that the honourable name of a British sailor should be so disgraced as this captain disgraced it by his drunken ruffianly conduct. was his drunkenness which made him a ruffian. But it Poor lads! it was a sad voyage for them. We hate and abominate slavery, and well we may. But their condition was something like slavery. Their ship was their prison. They were compelled, night and day, to go up aloft on the most dangerous service, and there was to one to whom they could complain. The captain, who ought to have been their protector, was their tyrant. Little did they think, when full of youthful glee, they went on board and left Southampton water, what they would have to go through; and little did their parents think how much their boys would suffer. How needful it is in these days, when so many are leaving their native shores to go abroad, before venturing to go out in any vessel, that they should know something of the captain and his crew. And we think all such would feel far more comfortable, even if they themselves had no regard for religion, if they knew the captain was a pious God-fearing man, for a man who fears God would never think of doing such wicked actions as those of which you have been reading. And then how mean and murderous was this man's conduct towards the poor helpless Chinese whom he deceived by his false promises. The day of judgment will reveal many such dark deeds, and then will the perpetrators of them be rewarded according to their deeds, for they cannot escape the Judgment of God. ANECDOTES AND SELECTIONS. Anecdotes and Selections. THE DEAF HEARER.-Mr. B- was not born deaf, yet he did not hear; he afterwards became deaf, and then he heard. How is this? In all the years of his outward hearing, his life was deeply estranged from God, and no heavenly voice penetrated his heart to unstop its utter deafness. The precepts, "Hear ye deaf," and "Ephphatha, Be opened," were unheeded. He had ears to hear, but did not hear. But, when deprived of his natural hearing, the Holy Spirit removed the deafness of his heart, and he has since had ever-listening ears to hear wha God the Lord will say. By embracing the christian faith, he received a new life, new hearing, new understanding, and has long and worthily maintained the christian course. He is still deaf to the recitals of christian experience from others, but has felt its blessed power in himself, and discloses it to their joyful edification. He has never heard a sermon, or a prayer, or a hymn of praise, during his religious life; but the sanctuary, and the social meeting of christians, have often been to him as the open gate of heaven. He can hear no sound of his own voice; and, when he speaks, he fears that no one will understand his broken speech: yet he audibly, and with great delight, reads the Holy Scriptures, conducts the stated family worship, and intelligently and earnestly addresses his brethren upon the great things of the kingdom of God. He often complains of great barrenness of soul, and what he terms an empty head religion, in distinction from a living and glorious devotion of the heart, while you would judge him to be unusually deep, spiritual, and abounding in the christian exercises. He keenly feels his deprivation, and especially in its obstruction to christian intercourse, yet he bears it with submission, and now expects to pass all his remaining days upon the earth shut up in this profound silence. But, deaf and faithful christian, be cheered. Rejoice that the ear of your heart has been opened to hearken to the word of the Lord. Rejoice that the blessed Bible is still your constant and divine preacher. Rejoice that the Spirit of God unfolds to you glories that the mere external ear of man hath never heard Rejoice that you are yet to share in the finished beatitude, where the ears of the deaf shall be for ever unstopped, and the tongue of the stammerer shall sing the new and everlasting song. "TO-MORROW is like a juggler that deceives us; a quack that pretends to cure us; and thin ice that will not bear our weight. It is a fruit beyond our grasp; a glittering bubble that bursts and vanishes away; a will-o-the-wisp that leads many into the mire, and a rock on which many mariners have struck and suffered shipwreck. It is an illusion to all who neglect the present hour, and a reality to those only who improve to-day." |