The Savannah morning news., 1902-10-05
MODERN JACK A SAD
SEA DOG NO MORE
He CuItvaes the draces Society When Ashore
longs to Y. M c. A Branches--AImost Every Ship
Few Blue Ribbon Hen 1t Now--Jack Doesn't
Believe in Getting Drunk Soon he
Touches Land.
Copyright, 1902, by Irving King.)

Up from the shining paths of the
sea, from the fields of foam and the
watery sleeps. come 10000 merchant
sailors month to pour themselves in
to the streets Of New York and rest a
while from their labors. Old ideas and
old superstitions die hard, and none
seems more gifted with baleful and
persistent life than the stereotyped idea
of Jack ashore" 1t is embalmed in
song and story. From the days of Dbl
din to the days of Strike up the band.
here comes a sailor" Jack ashore is
pictured as a reckless, irresponsible in
dividual, whose first act on striking
the beach is to get drunk, get into a
fight and seek lewd company, the devil
and all his works. Whatever Jack
ashore may have been in the past, to-
day he fulfills none of the require
ments of the popular picture of him. If
he did, these 20, 900 merchant sailors
month would make New York howl
and keep it bowling. AS it is, their
presence in port is unnoticed except
by those whose business brings them
into contact with the invading army
of the sea.
1t is probably because Kipling's-
Seven men from all the world back
to port again,
Keeling down the Ratcliff road, drunk
and raising CAIN
appeal more to the imagination than
Seven men from all the world" look
ing over the recent periodicals in
seaman's reading room, that the world
refuses to give up its old time idea of
Jack ashore.
The old time sailor who shivered his
timbers, damned his eyes and dashed
his tarry toplights is almost as extinct
as the dodo-gone with the Black Ball
Line to dance on Fiddler's Green with
Liverpool jack and Hanging John
n.y." And the sailor who considers it
his first duty on getting ashore to get
drunk and paint the town" is fast
following him into the limbo of things
which were picturesque but uncivil-
lied, like the feudal system and the
wampum age.
He hasn't quite gone yet, though.
The old time improvident registering
sailorman is still with us occasionally,
and can be found by looking for him,
sometimes without. 1t would be too
much to say that the character of the
world .seafaring population as a whole
has changed. but it is an indsputable
fact that it is rapidly changing.
Sailors as Skilled Workers.
To-day the sailor is simply a skilled
workman employed on vessel instead
of ashore. When he is ashore he is
taking his pleasure and the arrests
among the 10000 seamen who month
ly come ashore in the port of New
York are less in proportion than among
nth al ,1fx L., ~.
in considerable numbers for an outing
Twenty years ago a sailor who was
total abstainer was as hard to find as
'rcses in December, ice in June"
but to-day he is not at all I'M
common. Sarcely a ship comes into
port but has a few 'blue ribbon"
men on board of her. AS a rule, Jack
ashore still likes his beer, but he takes
ii in moderation. 1t would be absurd
to allege that Jack has turned angel
all at once. He still is very human and
liable to fall by the wayside. And
when he does fall he makes so much
row about it, after the bad old model,
that he helps to keep alive the tradi-
tons which would make all sailors
even as he. ben Bolt of the salt sea
wave" still has something about him
which differentiates him from a lands
man; and he will have till there shall
be no more sea" and the last sailor sails
no more: but morally he has become
just about what most other men are
afioat and ashore; If anything, a little
above the average.
Sailors Clubs Ashore.
Not many years ago there used to be
a score of places along the water front
patronized almost exclusively by sail
ors, where they caroused and danced
with their painted partners, reckless
abandoned. a prey to land-sharks, care
less of God and man. Now there is
not a real old time place of the sort in
the city. On West street, Charlton
street and Pike street there are free
reading rooms exclusively for sailors.
and these rooms are filed all the time,
every day, by Jack ashore In these
places Jacky reads the papers and
magazines, plays checkers or other
games, and meets and talks with men
of his calling from all over the world.
These are the sailors clubs, when
ashore, and no other club in the world
can show such a cosmopolitan gather
ing as one of these saiIors' reading