t-swear" the poor
victim of his brutality, and often the latter is deterred from seeking
redress by actual fear of still worse consequences in case he may be
defeated. Often too the wearied sufferer, on getting once more to
land--to his home, and among his friends--is so joyed at the termination
of his torments, that he loses all thoughts of justice or redress, and
leaves his tyrant to depart without punishment.

The history of emigration would furnish many a sad tale of petty tyranny
and spite, practised on the poor exile on the way to his wilderness
home. There are chapters that might be written of bullyism and
brutality--thousands of chapters--that would touch the chords of
sympathy to the very core of the heart. Many a poor child of
destitution--prostrated by the sickness of the sea--has submitted to the
direst tyranny and most fiendish abuse on the part of those who should
have cheered and protected him, and many a one has carried to his far
forest home a breast filled with resentment against the mariner of the
ocean. It is a matter of great regret, that the governments of
migrating nations will not act with more energy in this matter, and give
better protection to the exile, oft driven by misfortune in search of a
new home.

A pity it is that better laws are not made for the guidance and
restraint of merchant captains, who, taking them altogether, are
naturally as honest, and perhaps not less humane, than any other class
of men; but who thus entrusted with unbridled will and ill-defined
powers, but follow the common fashion of human nature, and become
tyrants of the very worst kind.

It is true that of late some salutary examples have been made, and one
who richly deserved it has suffered the extreme punishment of the law;
but it is to be feared that these good examples will not be followed up;
public feeling will subside into its old channel of indifference, and
the tyranny of the skipper-captain,--with that of his brutal coadjutor,
the mate,--will be allowed to flourish as of yore, to the torture of
many an unfortunate victim.

These remarks are hardly applicable to my own particular case, for the
fiends who tortured me would have done so all the same if the best laws
in the world had existed. They were beyond all laws, as I soon after
learnt,--all laws, human or divine--and of course felt neither
responsibility nor fear of punishment. They had no fear even to take my
life, as will be proved by the in