The Brookhaven leader., 1883-08-16
HIS SACRIFICES


HIS SACRIFICES
You must have experienced many
incDnvcniences and made great ,acrt-
tic =, going To sea so long and not Weld
ing To the many temptations which sur
round >ea-faring men; not partakilg of
offered drinks at the table, OF fricrds,
etc. sad Il lady Good Tcmplar to a
brother of the Order who had plowed a
good many burrows across the oceans of
this world.
Well yes, madam, the sacrifices which
my Temperance principles have cost
me have been away beyond anything
YOU have imagined. First thing that
attracted my notice at sea was the large
proport on Of Sea-faring men who. after
many long Years of hard and dangerous
service, stood in ragged suit of two
single garments and crazy pair of
castaway odd slippers, and could stow
away in one stocking, if they had one,
all their real estate and personal prop
erty, except their ruined constitution
and blasted hopes. The temptation to
work and drink and grow into an old
age of beggary and slavery like theirs
was next to irresistible You cant con-
ceive what a sacrifice it was to smother
that ambition.
Then there We're lots of men not old,
who had made a rapid climb up to the
grades of Chief Mate and Captain, be-
cause they We're talented, brave. capa-
BILE. generous, jolly fellows, who could
dare and do all things, and were liked
by everybody for their good qualities.
But after making "A rapid progress To the
first rank, their alliance with the whisky
bottle had somehow led them down to
the billet of steward, cook or COM
mon drunken jack, under a Captain
who perhaps had made his first trip as
a boy under their command. In one
voyage from China we had four men in
the forecastle who had been Captains of
foreign ships.
These men were regularly drunked
and robbed by the land-sharks every
time they arrived in harbor; were
then sold to another ship, and all their
advance, were it one, two or three
months wages, regularly stolen away
from them, As it most always is nova
davs in San Francisco. Now, madame,
can you understand what a heart-rack-
ing sacrifice it was not to drink and
follow in their footsteps, and be hoisted
on board ship as helpless as quarter
of beef or a sack of onions, and have
Mr.. Shark enjoy all my wages?
Then there were other sacrifices to
provide for. There were in port the
dram-shOp, the theater and the dance
cellar; these We're attractions so fas-
cinating that most of my esthetic breth-
Ill Il,
cash and the clothes and boots and
wraps that should have made them COM
Portable ON the long nights of a winter
passage around Cape Horn or from Eu
rope to New York.
To resist these allurements on shore,
and in their place to patronize the book
store, the clothiers, the reading-rooms
and the Bethel Sunday meetings, to
visit evenings at the homes of good,
honest, worthy families, whose hospi-
talitieS were gladly extended to the
stranger that avoided bad company, and
could interest them with descriptions of
foreign lands and strange peoples
and then to 90 to sea with plenty of
clothing and a modest bank book-to
have to suffer all this. you can Judge
what a cross it was not to drink.
Then later along, the man who avoid
ed the way of strong drink was always
given the trusty jobs and got the trusty
mans pay and the trusty mans adj
vancement. And all along his sober
habit led him into a higher and better
circle of friends and acquaintance than
the moderate drinker fell into. The fol-
lowing incident was one of u good
81 1oY hot la Il.
Your friend on his first visit to GER
tain large seaport was invited to the
house of the merchant consignee. At
dinner two decanters stood in front of
the host. ''Will you take port or sner-
ry?' said he. 1T may look singular,
but | take neither, sir" "Will you
have brandy? becr?'' mo, sir, new
er take anything of the kind; have not
for many years" Possible?" said he;
well it may be singular, but there is
nothing SO commends sea-faring man
to me as his total abstinence. Do
you know Captain N-?' Yes, he
is my intimate friend" "Well, Cap
tain N does not drink even coffee
and he is my favorite Captain; if you
are like him, you and he will always be
the two first TO get freight that | can
give or get in this port" And he made
bis word good as long as he lived.
The mere circumstance of our not
drinking was always getting us two
taken notice of by people whose ac-
quaintance was valuable to us and
pleasant as well, but who would never
have heard of us otherwise. These. al
though mostly drinking men, intro
duced us to others who interested them
selves in our behalf and made every
thing prosper under our hand. That is
the Kind OF sacrifice and suffering that
our total abstinence always kept heap
ing upon us.
And that is the kind of sacrifice that
our young readers will have to make
who touch not. taste not the unelean