A Relic of the Revolution
9781465634450
100 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
In presenting the following pages to the reader, the publisher has no ambition to aspire to the character of an author, and what is perhaps more rare, he has no private interest to serve; he does not seek to gratify the fastidious part of the community, who would have more respect for the dress, or appearance, than for the subject matter. He is perfectly aware that the Journal is not without some imperfections; but it must be kept in mind that it was not written for the public, with an eye to publication, or to make a book—but simply as a memorandum of the events of each day. Yet when we take into consideration all the circumstances, it is little less than a miracle; consider the author: a youth of scarcely nineteen summers—then the places where the records were made—the cable tier of a man-of-war, the gloomy recesses of a prison, or on board the battle ship, where three or four hundred men were crowded together for the purposes of strife and blood; then take into consideration the prohibition of all materials for writing in prison, the vigilance of the guards, and the frequent search made among the prisoners, and it becomes a matter of surprise, not that it has some imperfections, but that it exists at all, and especially that it was never interrupted. For the long imprisonment of more than two years, it seems to have been providentially preserved, for the purposes of bringing to light the hidden things of darkness, that those who should come after may be admonished and instructed. The reader will find the Journal free from all appearance of design or effort; it is perfectly natural; what is seen or heard is recorded with hardly a note or comment, from first to last; through their medium we are conducted through the hold of the prison-ship, and witness the privations and sufferings of the hapless victims; the prison hospital is thrown open to our inspection, not as transient visitors, but as witnesses of the daily occurrences; here we see justice and mercy meeting together; the walls, the bars, the guards, tell that here stern justice holds its victims, while the attendant physician, and gentle patience of the nurse, speak of Mercy’s visits, and pity. Then the prison doors grate on their hinges, and we enter; the vacant stare of the sons of Sorrow meet us, while their meager forms, sallow countenances and ragged habiliments, speak of their privations and misery; we seem to listen to their tale of woe, and hear them tell of happy homes and kind friends in their native land; we can almost taste their scanty and uninviting portions, and our sympathies become deeply interested, until we share in all their anxieties to obtain deliverance; we are sometimes almost suffocated while following the diggers in their excavations, to force a subterranean passage to the light of day and air of freedom; anon we are bounding over the fields as the minions of tyranny pursue us, until, weary and exhausted, we feel their ruthless hands upon us to drag us back to our gloomy habitations; then we feel the cold chill run over us, as we look forward to forty days and nights in darkness and solitude in the “Black hole,” on half the usual allowance of ordinary prisoners; we become acquainted with the “Two Fathers,” the messengers of Love and Pity—and while the donations continue we seem to enjoy a respite; hope and fear alternately rise and sink, until the donation closes, and transient joy gives way to deeper gloom, until some of the less determined seek relief on board the enemy’s ships of war, where they will be compelled to meet their friends and countrymen in the bloody strife—a destiny more horrible to the mind capable of reflection, than the protracted miseries of the prison cell.
