“Of course it will. That’s just what they’re a-goin’ to do it for, I suppose.”
Reader, the mode of dealing with the abominable “coper” traffic referred to by these men has at last happily been adopted, and the final blow has been dealt by the simple expedient of underselling the floating grog-shops in the article of tobacco. Very considerable trouble and expense have to be incurred by the mission, however, for the tobacco has to be fetched from a foreign port; but the result amply repays the cost for the men naturally prefer paying only 1 shilling per pound on board the mission-ship, to paying 1 shilling 6 pence on board the “coper.” The smacksman’s advantages in this respect may be better understood when we say that on shore he has to pay 4 shillings per pound for tobacco. But his greatest advantage of all—that for which the plan has been adopted—is his being kept away from the vessel where, while purchasing tobacco, he is tempted to buy poisonous spirits. Of course the anti-smoker is entitled to say “it were better that the smacksman should be saved from tobacco as well as drink!” But of two evils it is wise to choose the less. Tobacco at 1 shilling 6 pence procured in the “coper,” with, to some, its irresistible temptation to get drunk on vile spirits, is a greater evil than the procuring of the same weed at 1 shilling in a vessel all whose surroundings and internal arrangements are conducive to the benefit of soul and body.
“D’ye mind the old Swan, boys?” asked an elderly man—a former friend of David Bright who had dropped in with his mite of genuine sympathy.
“What, the first gospel-ship as was sent afloat some thirty years ago? It would be hard to remember what existed before I was born!”
“Well, you’ve heard of her, anyhow. She was lent by the Admiralty for the work in the year eighteen hundred and something, not to go out like the Ensign to the North Sea fleets, but to cruise about an’ visit in the Thames. I was in the Swan myself for a few months when I was a young fellow, and we had grand times aboard of that wessel. It seemed to me like a sort o’ home to the sailors that they’d make for arter their woyages was over. Once, I reklect, we had a evenin’ service, an’ as several ships had come in from furrin parts that mornin’ we had the Swan chock-full o’ noo hands; but bless you, though they was noo to us they warn’t noo to each other. They had many of ’em met aboard the Swan years before. Some of ’em hadn’t met for seven and ten year, and sich a shakin’ o’ hands there was, an’ recognisin’ of each other!—I thought we’d never get the service begun. Many of ’em was Christian men, and felt like brothers, you see.”
“Did many of the masters an’ mates come to the services in those days?” asked Joe Davidson.
“Ay, a-many of ’em. W’y, I’ve seed lots o’ both masters an’ mates wolunteerin’ to indoose their men to come w’en some of ’em warn’t willin’—takin’ their own boats, too, to the neighbourin’ ships an’ bringin’ off the men as wanted to, w’en the Swan’s bell was a-ringin’ for service. I heard one man say he hadn’t bin to a place o’ worship for ten year, an’ if he’d know’d what the Swan was like he’d ha’ bin to her sooner.
“I mind meetin’ wery unexpected with a friend at that time,” continued the old fisherman, who saw that his audience was interested in his talk, and that the mind of poor Mrs Bright was being drawn from her great sorrow for a little. “I hadn’t met ’im for eight or ten years.
“‘Hallo! Abel,’ says I, ‘is that you?’
“‘That’s me,’ says he, ketchin’ hold o’ my grapnel, an’ givin’ it a shake that a’most unshipped the shoulder. ‘Leastwise it’s all that’s left o’ me.’