“Why, they would have starved if it had not been for me,” replied I, angrily.
“That’s very true, boy,” replied the mate; “but you have to learn yet, that might is right; and recollect that what you did this morning has not made you any great favourite with them.”
“What was that?” inquired my companion.
“Only that he nearly drove his knife through one of the men, that’s all,” replied the mate; “English sailors ar’n’t fond of knives.”
He then touched his hat, and went down again to the pool, desiring me to follow him with a kid for our share of the supper. I did so, and on my return she asked me why I had drawn my knife upon the seaman, and I narrated how it occurred. She pointed out to me the impropriety of what I had done, asking me whether the Bible did not tell us we were to forgive injuries.
“Yes,” replied I; “but is it not injuries to ourselves? I did forgive Jackson; but this was to prevent his hurting another.”
“Another! Why you talk of Nero as if the animal was a rational being, and his life of as much consequence as that of a fellow-creature. I do not mean to say but that the man was very wrong, and that you must have felt angry if an animal you were so fond of had been killed; but there is a great difference between the life of an animal and that of a fellow-creature. The animal dies, and there is an end of it; but a man has an immortal soul, which never perishes, and nothing can excuse your taking the life of a man, except in self-defence. Does not the commandment say, ‘Thou shalt not kill?’”
She then talked to me a long while upon the subject, and fully made me understand that I had been very wrong, and I confessed that I had been so.