er sense of comfort than he had
experienced for years, as he entered a pleasant little chamber in this
truly homelike abode. When he had made the acquaintance of the
kind-hearted landlady, he found her willing to let him remain, even
after he had told her of his destitute condition; and she promised that
every effort should be made to restore to him his hard earnings.
On going back to his snug quarters, after this conversation, there was
something like thankfulness to the Giver of all good in Jack's heart. By
his bedside he found a Bible, a volume which he had not seen since the
one his mother gave him was lost, five years before, when he was wrecked
upon the coast of Africa. He thought of the sermon which he had heard
that afternoon, and took up the book to look for the text,--"The sea
shall give up its dead." The first words upon which his eye fell
were,--"For this my son was lost and is found." The beautiful story of
the Prodigal Son, as he had heard it in childhood, came full into his
mind, and he remembered how often he had read it at his mother's knee.
The tears rolled down his cheek, as, sitting down beside the little pine
table, he read again that touching picture of God's love for his
wandering children; and when he came to the confession of the penitent
son, it burst forth from his own heart.
From that hour Jack has been a changed man. Some of the benevolent
persons in the city of New York, who have the welfare of mariners so
much at heart, procured him a new situation, favorable to his
improvement in character; and the next ship in which he sailed was
commanded by a pious captain, who was a good friend to every man on
board. When he returned from this cruise, he felt too old for another
long voyage, and for the future was going to try and content himself
with being out for two or three months on expeditions like that in which
he is at present engaged.
Perhaps, dear Bennie, I have tired you by repeating this long story,
which cannot be as interesting to you as it was to me from Jack's own
lips, in the morning after a night of such excitement, with the sailors
standing around, listening attentively to every word of it. Even brother
Clarendon was touched by the earnest exhortations to them with which the
narrative closed; and it seems as if being out of society had made him
more serious than he ever was before. He laughs at me now very often,
and says I was cut out for a Methodist preacher; but on Sunday he
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