The Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1837-1867, 1846-05-30

est company. .....5. .........-.
for many months had seen sullen low
| cfing fellow, with cropped heud, roncd-legs.
and the molly garments of disgrace, driven
| iorth at early morning with his gang of bad
compeers slave, toiling till nightlall in pill
ing cannon balls, and chipping off the rust
WIN heaVy hammers; sentinel stood near
WIN loaded musket they might not speak
10 each other, that miserable gang; hope was
dead among them; life had no delights, they
wreaked their silent hatred on those hammer
Ell cannon balls. The man who struck fierc-
esf,that sullen convict with the lowering,brow
was our stock-jobber John Dilaway.
soon after that foretaste of slavery at Wool
wich, the ship sailed, freighted with incarnatc
CRIME; her captain was rufilan, (conld he
heip II, with such cargoesD her crew tile
otiscourlng ofali nntons;and the chesapeake
herself was an old rotten hull, condemned at-
ter one more voyage,to be broken up; creak-
ing, foul, unsafe vessel,iu of rats,c ocIroach-
es, and other vermin. .
The sun glared ungRnially at that blot upon
the waters, breeding infectious disease; the
waves flung the hated burden from one TO a.
mother, disdainiul of her freight of sin; the
winds had no commission for fair sailing, but
whIstled through the rigging cross ways,
howllng In the ears ofmany i'll that ship, ms
/
| very rocks and reefs butted her offthe creamy
line OF breakers, as sea-unicorns distortingno
attecuonnte tareIvells blessed her on depart
IRE; no hearty welcomes await her n: the
l. port.
| And rhey sailed many days as in n floating
hell, hot, miserable, and cursing; the scanty
meal was flung TO them like dogs meat, and
they Tapped the putrid water from pail; gang
| by gang for an hour they might pace the
smoking deck, and then and thence were
driven down, to tester in the hold Of three
and twenty more. o those closed matches
by pight, what torneuts were the kernel of
that ship! Suffocated 10y the heat and noX-
ious smells; bruised against each other, aud
| by each others blows, as the black unweldly
vessel staggered about amongst the pillows
the wretched mass ofhuman misery wore n
way those tropical nights in horrid impreca-
ton: worse than crowded slaves upon the
Spanish Main, from their blister ofcrime up
on their souls, and their utter lack of hope
fulness forever.
| And now, after all the SCATTERING storms,
and haggard sutierings and degrading terrors
of that voyage, they neared the metropolis of
Sin; some town on Botany Bay, blighteG
shore, where each man, looking Mt his neigh
Dor, sees in him an outcast from heaven
They landed in droves,-that ironed flock of
men;--and the sllllenest looking scoundrel
ofthem all was John Dillaway.
| There were murderers among his gang:
but human passions, which had hurried them
TO crime, had now left them as il wrecked up
on lee shore,-humble and remorseful and
heavens happier sun shed some light upon
their faces; there were burglars;hut the cour-
age which could dare these deeds, now lend
ing strength to bear the stroke ofpunishment
enabled them to walk forth even cheerily to
meet their doom oflabor; there was rape; bat
he hid himself, ashamed, avowing better
things fiery arson, too, was there, sorry for
his rash revenge: also, conspiracy and rebel
lion, coniessing that ambition such rs theirs
had been wickedness and folly; and common
frauds, and crimes, and social sins; bad
lenough, God wot, vet hopeful: but the mean,
heartless, devliish criminality of our young
Dagon beat them all. Tito be hard-hearted
were virtue, the best man there was John
Dillaway
And now they were TO be billeted off among
the sturdy colonists, as farm servants, near
akin to slaves; tools in the rough hands of
men who pioneer civilization, with all the
vices of the social, and all the passions of the
savage. And on the strand, where those
task masters congregate to inspect the new
come droves,each man selected according to
his mind: the rougher took the toughest, and
the genter the gentlest: the merry looking
field farmer sought out the cheerful, aud the
sullen backwoods settler chose the sullen.-
D!llaways master was swarthy, bcetIe-brow-
ed caititf' who had worn out his own seven
years ofpenalty, and had now set up tyrant
for himself.
Asa newer OF wood, and drawer OF wa
ter, in stagnant little clearing OF the forest,
our convict toiled continually, continually
like Caliban: all days alike; hewinS at the
mighty trunk, and hacking up the Struggling
branches no hope, no help, no respite; and
| the iron IF sprvila fVraDpV entered into his