This kind of diversion betrays a want of humane
consideration in the contriver. It is infinitely more cruel and
unamiable than Spanish bull-baitings, or the gladiatorial shows of the
ancients, inasmuch as a shock to the finest feelings of human nature
is harder to bear, and longer in duration, than the momentary pang
induced by witnessing a merely physical suffering.
THE OLD SAILOR.
In my school vacations I used occasionally to visit an old sailor
friend, a man of uncommon natural gifts, and that varied experience of
life which does so much to supply the want of other means of
education. He must have been a handsome man in his youth, and though
time and hardship had done their utmost to make a ruin of his bold
features, and had made it needful to braid his still jetty black locks
together to cover his bald crown, his was a fine, striking head yet,
to my boyish fancy. I loved to sit at his feet, and hear him tell the
events of sixty years of toil and danger, suffering and well-earned
joy, as he leaned with both hands upon his stout staff, his body
swaying with the earnestness of his speech. His labors and perils were
now ended, and in his age and infirmity he had found a quiet haven. He
had built a small house by the side of the home of his childhood, and
his son, who followed his father's vocation, lived under the same
roof.
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