“I told him that I could steer a ship, and take observations; I did not mention my competency to do the other parts of navigation, for I was afraid to prejudice him against me; for individuals of that class pride themselves on the idea that the great secret of managing a ship, is in their hands alone, and that other men are, or ought to be—entirely ignorant of it.
“Finally, I asked him to examine me, on the mariner’s compass, and on navigation.
“He readily did so, and the ignorant creature put me some miserable questions, about the sun’s altitude at noon, and some such matter which he had been mechanically taught. I answered them, and encouraged all the while the important and patronizing air which he had assumed. When we have no money, and desire the accomplishment of any purpose, we must learn to use towards men, a passport that is equivalent—a sympathy with their vanity. The result was, that I was immediately granted a passage to Jamaica, on condition that I should work it.
“As I sailed down the Thames and gazed on the banks of the river, I became a prey to the saddest reflections. Fancy had often whispered to me thoughts of a brilliant and happy career. The lightness of heart with which I began and prosecuted my studies; the happiness which I derived from them, and my total unacquaintance with the world, had never permitted me to speculate a moment on the possibility of misfortune or of distress. I had fondly cherished the hope, that in Europe, the centre of the highest human civilization, I should have been able one day to bring down some truth from the stars to mankind, and should have crowned the labours of a lifetime, with banishing away some of the ignorance in which the human species was enveloped. But when I experienced the prostration of want—the prostration that arises not from an enfeebling of the body, or from a decay of mind, but simply from not possessing the conventional medium of exchange; when I saw that our most glorious enterprises are subject, on account of a necessary evil of civilisation, and the iniquitous habits of mankind, to be blasted; I became persuaded that, without money, no man can hope to propagate truth; and the difficulty of carrying my projects into execution was forced upon me. This, however, could partly be overcome. But as I left Europe, I felt that all hopes of realizing my designs were gone.
“The ardour which had, however, inflamed me in one pursuit, fired me also in another, and to it was added the force of unswerving necessity;—that of visiting on the individual who was the primary source of my sufferings, the same amount of them as I was enduring.
“But I find I am becoming prolix. It is now late—you and I require rest; come again to-morrow night and I shall let you hear the other part of the adventures, which have ended in leaving me a prisoner on board your father’s ship, and a narrator to you of my history.”
The young officer rose up, and, shaking hands with Appadocca, bade him good night with that melancholy sympathy which only true and disinterested friendship can inspire.