'Pictures?'
'Ay, pictures--pictures that would just grip the fancy of nine out of every ten Kanakas; pictures showing how the cruel and wicked lotu Peretania (Protestant faith) was sending people to hell; pictures showing an English missionary chasing a native woman--with thundering lies printed at the foot; pictures showing Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary dressed in store clothes.'[#]
[#] Note by the author.--This school primer of which Harvey speaks was actually circulated in the South Seas by the Roman Catholic missionaries. It was printed in Marseilles, but other editions were issued from Sydney in 1866 or 1867.
'Oh, stop, Mr. Harvey, stop! Don't speak like that! Don't laugh so mockingly when you name our Saviour!'
'Mockingly, Tom? No! I'm a rough sailor, and a fit man to be an officer for such a hell afloat as the brig Leonie. I'm as bad as any man can be morally, but I am no mocker of sacred things.'
'I did not mean to hurt or offend you, Mr. Harvey. And I know that you are neither a brute nor a bully.'
The second mate placed his hand on Tom's shoulder.
'I'm glad to hear you say that, Tom, and I wish it was true. But I was brought up in a rough school--in the fo'c'sle of a New Bedford whaler--and I guess I've been getting more and more of a brute and a basher every day of my life. My father was an Irishman and a Roman Catholic, but didn't care a cuss for the priest; my mother was not only an Irishwoman and a holy Roman, but a bigoted one as well, and taught me from the very first to hate and despise the Protestants; and I hated and despised them profusely until I went to sea in the whaler, and found out that a Protestant was just as good a sailor-man as any holy Roman. But I was going to tell you about those pictures.'
He laughed again, and his usually gloomy face was so lit up, that Tom could not help smiling in anticipation.
'These good, gentle priests,' continued Harvey, 'hate Englishmen and Americans like poison; they cause more bloodshed and misery by their lies---- There, that's all. I'm off on deck for a smoke before supper.'