Two Years Before the Mast Part 22

But in the rising heat of political feeling, other people did not make a like distinction, and Dana, a young lawyer, married now, and with a family growing up about him, found himself put out into the cold by the well-to-do, the successful, and the respectable.

Dana had a keen scent for politics, and he looked with the strongest interest upon the great political movement which was stirring the country; but he did not espouse the cause of free soil because he expected to profit by it politically. On the contrary, he knew that he was shutting himself out from political preferment by such a course, and at the same time was imperilling his professional success. It was the act of a man who stood up for the cause of righteousness, without counting the cost. In like manner he now had the opportunity of ill.u.s.trating afresh his att.i.tude toward the law, for he held that law was for the accomplishment of justice, and that it was most glorious when its strong arm protected and defended the weak and downtrodden. By a natural course, therefore, he became a prominent counsel for those unfortunate negroes who, at this time, in Boston, were held as fugitive slaves. While the ingenuity of some was expended in putting the law on the side of the strong and the rich, Dana, who was convinced in his mind that the law of the state was honestly to be invoked in defence of the fugitive slave, gave himself heart and soul to the work of applying the law, and received no remuneration for his services in any fugitive slave case. Instead, he received at the close of one of the most important cases, a blow from a blackguard which narrowly missed maiming him for life.

It is worth while to read what Dana wrote after rendering all the aid he could in the defence of Anthony Burns: ''The labors of a lawyer are ordinarily devoted to questions of property between man and man. He is to be congratulated if, though but for once, in any signal cause he can devote them to the vindication of any of the great primal rights affecting the highest interests of man.'' He was a member of the noted Free Soil Convention at Buffalo of 1848, and presided at the first meeting of the Republican party in Ma.s.sachusetts.

It may be a source of wonder to some that Dana, who achieved a great literary success in the book which he wrote when a young man, did not pursue literature as an avocation, if not as a vocation. He published but one other book, a narrative of a trip to Cuba made in 1859, and he wrote a few magazine articles. The explanation must be found in the temperament and character of the man. His ''Two Years Before the Mast'' is a vivid representation of what he saw and experienced at a most impressionable age. He put his young life into it; he was not thinking of literature when he wrote it, and thus the book takes rank with those books which are bits of life rather than products of art. Afterward he was immersed in his law practice, and he was a prodigious worker. He saw with great clearness the points in the cases he took up, and he was untiring in his industry to cover the whole case. He did all the work himself; he did not lay the details on others, and avail himself of their diligence. His time, moreover, as we have shown, was very much at the disposal of those who could pay him little or nothing for his services, and he gave months of labor to the unremunerative defence of the fugitive slave. Moreover, his deep religious conviction and his high sense of legal honor often stood in the way of his profit. So it was that his life was one of hard work and little more than support of his family. There was scant time for any wandering into fields of literature.

Yet he left behind him some other writings which show well that the hand which penned the ''Two Years'' never lost its cunning. He made an interesting visit to Europe, and, later in life, in 1859-60, made a journey round the world. The record which he kept on these journeys has been drawn upon largely in the biography[2]

prepared by Charles Francis Adams, who was in his early days a student in Dana's office, and there one finds page after page of delightfully animated description and narrative. He wrote for his own pleasure and for that of his family, and his writing was like brilliant talk, the outflow of a generous mind not easily saved for more common use. He published notes to Wheaton's ''International Law,'' several of which are quoted in all new works on the subject to this day.

The journey which he took round the world was for the purpose of restoring his health, which had been greatly impaired. He came back in improved condition, and entered upon the excited period of the war, when he held the office of United States District Attorney. During this time he argued the famous prize causes before the United States Supreme Court, and his argument was the one that turned the Court, which was democratic in its politics, to take the unanimous view that the United States Government had a right to establish blockade and take prizes of foreign vessels that were breaking this blockade. Had it not been for this decision, so largely influenced, as the Court itself generously states, by Mr. Dana's argument, the Civil War would have been greatly prolonged, with possibly another, or at least a doubtful issue. He afterward served in the Ma.s.sachusetts legislature, and there made several noted speeches, among others his argument on the repeal of the usury laws, a bill for which was unexpectedly carried in that body as the result of this speech which has been reprinted for use before legislatures of other states.

He accepted a nomination to Congress, chiefly as a protest against the nomination of B. F. Butler, who was running on a paper money and repudiation platform against the principles of his own party, but Mr. Dana was defeated. In 1876 he was nominated by President Grant minister to England, but his nomination was not confirmed by the Senate, for his nomination had been made without consulting the Senatorial cabal and also he had bitter enemies, who carried on a warfare against him upon terms which he was too honorable to accept.

A selection of Mr. Dana's speeches, the most interesting historically or those of most present value, have been published, together with a biographical sketch,[3] supplementing the Life written by Charles Francis Adams.

Two years later, broken now in health, but with his mind vigorous, he resolved to give up the practice of law and devote himself to writing a work on international law. For this purpose, and as a measure of economy, he went to Europe, and for two years applied himself diligently to his plan for a book which he believed would give some fundamentally new views on international law. He had made many notes and had begun to write the first few chapters when he died, after a short illness, from pneumonia, in Rome, January 6, 1882. He was buried in the beautiful Protestant cemetery of that city.

His wife, who was Sarah Watson of Hartford, Conn., survived him, and he left five daughters and a son. There are now nine of his grandchildren living (four of them Dana grandsons), and also four great-grandchildren.

Finally, what did Mr. Dana accomplish for sailors? In the preface to the first edition (1840) he said, ''If it shall . . . call more attention to the welfare of seamen, or give any information as to their real condition which may serve to raise them in the rank of beings, and to promote in any measure their religious and moral improvement, and diminish the hards.h.i.+ps of their daily life, the end of its publication will be answered.'' And after the flogging at San Pedro, there was his vow (page 1252), ''that, if G.o.d should ever give me the means, I would do something to redress the grievances and relieve the sufferings of that cla.s.s of beings with whom my lot had so long been cast.'' For redressing individual grievances he took the part of the sailor in many a lawsuit where his remuneration was often next to nothing, and by which action he incurred the ill will of possible future rich and influential clients. In his journal December 14, 1847, he says, ''I often have a good deal to contend with in the slurs or open opposition of masters and owners of vessels whose seamen I undertake to defend or look after,'' though he adds there were honorable exceptions. These cases he fought hard and bravely, and into them he put his whole mind, heart and soul. He could not have done better in them if he had been paid the highest fees known to the Bar. He settled as many of these cases out of court as he could. He believed any reasonable settlement better for the sailor than a legal contest, though his own fees would be less. Beside taking the part of the individual seamen, he published the ''Seamen's Friend,'' a book giving the full legal rights of sailors as well as their duties, a set of definitions of sea terms, which to this day is quoted in all the dictionaries, and much information for the use of beginners. He drew up a pet.i.tion and prepared an accompanying leaflet addressed to Congress for ''The More Speedy Trial of Seamen.'' He wrote numerous articles for the press and delivered many addresses on behalf of seamen, or for inst.i.tutions for their benefit such as ''Father'' Taylor's Bethel and for a more cordial reception of sailors in the church.

He wrote the introduction of Leech's ''A Voice from the Main Deck,'' but above all it was the indirect influence of his ''Two Years Before the Mast'' which did the most to relieve their hards.h.i.+ps.

While on a trip in Europe in 1875-76, I spent some weeks in London and visited Parliament frequently to study the proceedings and see and hear its leading men. By a strange coincidence at my very first visit, made at the invitation of the late Sir William Vernon Harcourt, after I had sent in my card and was ushered into the inner lobby, I saw a man, evidently a member, rus.h.i.+ng out into this lobby, and, to quote from my journal written at the time, ''in a wild state of excitement, throwing about his arms and shaking his fists, with short e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns such as 'I'll expose the villains, all of them,' and I heard the words 'Cheats!' and I think 'Liars!''' This was a strange introduction to the then decorous British House of Commons, for this was before the active days of Parnell. I saw poor, blind Henry Fawcett[4] and others trying to calm the man. The lobby was immediately cleared of strangers, so I saw no more just then, but I was later admitted into the House and learned that this man was the famous Plimsoll (1824-1898). He had become enraged because his Merchants' s.h.i.+pping Bill had just been thrown out by Disraeli, then Prime Minister, on this day of the so-called ''Slaughter of the Innocents,'' that is, the day when the Government abandoned all bills which they were not to carry out that session. Justin McCarthy, in his ''History of Our Own Times'' (Vol. IV, page 24, et seq.), gives a full account of this scene. Plimsoll's Bill was a measure for the protection of seamen against the danger of being sent to sea in vessels unfit for the voyage. To understand the whole situation of the sailor in civilized countries, one must know that the only way allowed by law or custom for him to get employment is to sign articles sometimes without even knowing the name of the vessel, and almost always without an opportunity to examine or even see her. Once having signed these papers, sailors are by law compelled to keep their contracts and can be imprisoned and sent aboard if they try to escape. Every other person in every other kind of employment, since the abolition of slavery, signing similar papers has a right to refuse to carry out his agreement, with no other penalty than a suit for damages. He cannot be forced to carry out the contract in person. If this were not so, there would be a sort of contract peonage or slavery endorsed by the law. It is otherwise, however, with the sailors. The United States Supreme Court in the case of Robertson v. Baldwin (165 U.S. 275, 1896) decided, Judge Harlan dissenting, that notwithstanding the thirteenth amendment to the Const.i.tution which, it was supposed, had prohibited involuntary servitude except as punishment for crime, sailors could be forced on board of vessels, and the facts that the vessel was unfit for living, the food bad, and the master brutal were no defences. The headnote of the case says, ''The contract of a sailor has always been treated as an exceptional one involving to a certain extent the surrender of his personal liberty during the life of his contract.'' Mr. Plimsoll was rightly convinced that unseaworthy vessels left port for the sake of insurance money on valued policies, that the lives of the seamen were thereby imperilled, and that the poor sailor had no redress before the law. The bill that had just been thrown out by Disraeli provided that if one-quarter of the seamen appealed on the ground of unseaworthiness a survey would be ordered, the vessel detained till the survey was made, and if she were unseaworthy or improperly provisioned the sailors would be relieved from their contract unless those defects were cured. It also had other minor provisions for the benefit of the sailors. In Parliament that night, it was thought that Plimsoll's wild conduct had destroyed his reputation as a sane man and had ruined the chances of ever pa.s.sing his bill, but outside of Parliament the effect was just the reverse. The public was aroused to a full understanding of the essential merits of his bill and the government was forced to put it on the calendar and carry it through that session in its substantial features, and the following year (1876) a more complete and perfected act covering the same points was pa.s.sed.

In the United States, a most interesting character, Andrew Furuseth, a Norwegian, himself a sailor, and without much education but a man of wonderful force, has succeeded, largely by the aid of labor unions, in forcing through Congress bills by which no American seaman can any longer be forced against his will into this servitude nor any foreign seaman on domestic voyages.

Another evil tending to degrade and enslave the sailor was the allowance made by law of three months' advance wages on beginning a voyage. This apparently harmless and, to the credulous and inexperienced legislator, beneficial provision gave a chance to the sailors' boarding-house keeper and runner, or ''crimp,'' as he or she is called, to ''shanghai'' seamen and put them aboard drunk or drugged, with little or no clothing but what they had on their backs and rob them of this advance money. The ''crimps''' share of this money in San Francisco alone has been calculated at one million dollars a year, or equal to eighty per cent of the seamen's entire wages. Part of this had to be shared with corrupt police and politicians and some of it has been traced to sources ''higher up.'' So common was this practice that vessels sailing from San Francisco and New York had so few sober sailors aboard, that it was customary to take longsh.o.r.emen to set sail, heave anchor and get the s.h.i.+p under way, and then send them back by tug.

This is precisely what happened on the well-equipped and new s.h.i.+p on which I sailed from New York in 1879 for California, and the same situation is described by Captain Arthur H. Clark in his account of seamen in his ''Clipper s.h.i.+p Era.'' These poor sailors, without proper clothing, had to draw on the s.h.i.+p's ''slop chest''

for necessary oilskins, thick jackets, mittens and the like, and used up almost all the rest of their wages. The small balance was wasted or stolen, or both, at the port of arrival, and off they were s.h.i.+pped again by the ''crimp'' with no chance to save or improve their condition. After years of agitation by the friends of sailors the advance pay is now wholly abolished in the coastwise trade in America and the three months' advance cut down to one in the foreign trade, immensely to the benefit of the sailor and the discouragement of the ''crimp.'' The argument that without this system of bondage and ''crimpage'' it would be impossible to secure crews is fully answered by the experience of Great Britain since the pa.s.sage of the Plimsoll Acts and in the United States since the recent acts of Congress. On the contrary, these measures tend to secure a better cla.s.s of sailors and compel improvement of the conditions under which they do their work. I was told when in England that Plimsoll, who himself was not a sailor, was influenced among other things by my father's book ''Two Years Before the Mast.''

THE END

[1] He was Richard Henry Dana, Jr., when he wrote his book, and continued to be called so through life, for his father, a poet and litterateur, lived to the age of ninety-two, and died but three years before his son.

[2] Richard Henry Dana, Jr. A Biography. By Charles Francis Adams.

In two volumes. Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin Company.

[3] Speeches in Stirring Times and Letters to a Son. Richard H.

Dana, Jr. Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin Company, 1910.

[4] The political economist and M.P.