"Father Clark," or The Pioneer Preacher

by John Mason Peck

The sailor who had let out the secret of John’s praying, was in a serious mood. He had taken a kind of sailor prejudice to Clark when he first came aboard, and manifested no disposition to be on terms of intimacy. This sailor, whom we will call Tom Halyard, (having forgotten his real name) had been sick for several days, and was neglected by his shipmates,—even those of his own mess, except Clark, who nursed him, obtained from the cook a little nourishing soup, and showed so much sympathy as to spoil all his prejudices and win his confidence. There is nothing like sympathy and kindness to work one’s way into the heart’s core of a true sailor. Taking advantage of a convenient interview in private, when he was beginning to recover, Clark had a long conversation with this man on personal religion, and the way of salvation through Jesus Christ.

Thomas Halyard had a pious mother, who in giving him some of the formal lessons prescribed by the English church, talked to him about his state by nature as a sinner in such a way as no one but a mother can talk. Tom’s mother died when he was a little boy. His father was a profane drunkard, and cared nothing for godliness, and hated God-fearing people. His repeated acts of outrage and abuse of the poor motherless boy, drove all filial feelings from his heart, and made him disgusted with his father’s brutal manners. He ran away while quite a youth, and went on board a ship. He soon learned the habits of a sailor, and could swear as profanely and drink as full an allowance of grog as the best of them in the ship. Yet there were moments when the image of his mother, and especially her dying words to him, and prayer and praise to God, would come with power on his memory. He had once been sick when he was a little child, and his kind mother nursed him, placed her hand on his feverish brow, and spoke words of kindness and love in his ear, which he could never forget. The kindness and conversation of Clark, during his recent illness, had broken through the crust that the world and a wicked life had encased his softer nature in, and unsealed the fountain. Tom wept like a child as he lay in his hammock, and listened to the simple teaching of his brother sailor, and heard him read lessons of instruction from the Book of God.

John Clark told him some thing of the history of his own life, how he left the man-of-war and swam ashore, and how God mercifully preserved his life in that perilous adventure. But when he told him how the Lord brought him to see his wretched state as a sinner, and the wonderful deliverance and joys of pardoning mercy in the interior of South Carolina, and the new life he since lived;—all was so strange and wonderful,—so unlike any thing he had heard before, and with all so touching, that the tears rolled down the weather-beaten cheeks of this tar; he sobbed aloud, and before he was aware of the scene he was enacting, John Clark was on his knees beside his hammock, praying in an audible, but low, musical voice for his salvation. No wonder the sin-struck sailor thought John could pray better than the parsons could with a book. True, he knew very little about parsons, for he had followed the sea more than twenty years, and during that time had seen “divine service” performed on land not half a dozen times. Sometimes he heard the burial service read by a captain over the mortal remains of some shipmate, who had been sent to “Davy Jones’ Locker,” over the ship’s side.

From the time Mr. Halyard disclosed the character of John Clark to the crew, he was treated with particular respect. Wild and wicked, and as little disposed to knock off drinking and swearing, and put on religion, all respected their shipmate John Clark. The officers found out the “cut of his jib,” and treated him accordingly. Sailors find out the peculiar traits of human nature quite as soon as any class. Had Clark put on a sour face and assumed the airs of a religious man; had he been unsocial and moody, and reproved them in a harsh and unkind tone of voice, and in presence of others for their drinking, swearing and frolicking habits, and taken pains to appear peculiarly righteous, he would have seen trouble. They would have regarded him a graceless hypocrite, and treated him with contempt and persecution. He gave them no direct reproofs, and yet his manners and intercourse, courteous, kind and winning, impressed their consciences more than a hundred moral lectures would have done. They feared him, respected him and even loved him.

The voyage finally wore away, and they were in the port of London and safely moored, on Saturday; after sailing up the river Thames from its mouth at the Nore, about forty-five miles. At that period London was a great city, though since that period, its population has more than doubled; its fine houses and long, winding streets have extended, and its blocks and squares, have gone far out into what was then open country. Boarding-houses for sailors were then a horrible “den of thieves,” and the abodes of intoxication and other infamous vices. And, even in this age of philanthropy and reform, there are numerous places in London and all other large seaports where decoys are employed to entice the newly arrived mariner to places where he can be filched of his money, his senses and his life. But Christian philanthropy has hoisted the Bethel flag, as the signal where sailors can worship God in comfort and peace, and boarding-houses have been established as places of virtue, good order, temperance and comfort for this useful class of humanity. John Clark had no inclination for accommodations in houses of infamy, and Tom Halyard seemed very much inclined to follow his example.

Sabbath morning came; the sun shone dimly through the smoke and haze of a London atmosphere, and the sailors generally were making preparations to desecrate the Lord’s day by their customary visits to rum shops and infamous houses. Mr. Clark had risen early and performed the service required of him as a sailor, put off his tarpaulin dress, and appeared on deck with a smiling countenance, in a neat and cleanly suit, having, as the sailors said, the “cut and jib of a land-lubber.” One of his shipmates cried out,—“halloo, Jack,—whither ahoy now?” “I’m going to find a place to worship God, with his people.” Clark lingered on deck for a few moments on the Sabbath morning, when Thomas Halyard appeared in his Sunday suit, rigged out in real sailor trim.

“Where away now, Tom?” enquired one of the sailors, while he cocked his eye at another, with the true sailor leer, and rolled his quid from one cheek to the other. “Only going a short voyage on land with Jack Clark”—was the response, in a serious tone.

“I’ll be harpooned if Tom Halyard is not a-going to turn parson,” said one. “Not yet,” replied another. “Tom was on the sick list not long since, and thought he was bound for kingdom come;—and Jack Clark physicked the old boy out of him, and he’s now going to chapel to pay off old scores.” “And I’ll tell you what, shipmates,” said another, “we’ve all been bad enough to be keel-hauled, and John Clark and Thomas Halyard are as good sailors as I ever wish to mess with. ’Spose we follow them and hear what the parson says to-day?” “Agreed,” said several voices, and away they went up the street, headed by Clark and Halyard, who walked lovingly arm in arm.

It became a fixed principle in the mind of Mr. Clark, at that early period of his religious history to follow as Providence led; or, which was the same thing to him, after a season of prayer for divine direction, to follow such impressions of his own mind as appeared to spring from a truthful and right source. Neither he, nor his companion knew any chapel in London, or where to go;—but they walked on in a friendly manner. Mr. Halyard asked questions how they were to conduct themselves in church, and Mr. Clark described how the meetings were managed in Georgia.

They had passed through several streets, when Mr. Clark saw a man walking in the same direction, and ventured to inquire if he could direct them to some chapel where the gospel was preached. “And it’s being afther the gospel ye would be axing? Well, it’s mesel’ that answer ye, for I’m a going there mesel’—’Tis to the Foundry ye’d like to go?” Clark replied they were strangers in London, just from ship-board, and wished to find some church where they could hear the gospel. The honest Hibernian with whom they had come in contact, was a zealous Methodist, then on his way to the “Foundry,” in Moorfields, where the celebrated John Wesley established his regular meetings in 1739. This venerable patriarch of Methodism was still there, and though fourscore years old, preached on the occasion of the sailors’ visit. Mr. Clark had heard of the achievements of Mr. Wesley, from the preachers in Georgia, and it had been among his warmest aspirations to see and hear this distinguished divine before his return to America. It was a singular providence that guided him to the Foundry chapel the first Sabbath he spent in London. The scene was almost overpowering, and he listened with rapt attention and drank in every word the preacher uttered.