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POOR JACK

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Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Aug 27, 1896

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 22, No. 34.

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POOR JACK.

Years ago a sailor before the mast, coming into port, was regarded as a dangerous outcast. After the long confinement on shipboard, he was turned loose in a strange city, his pockets full of money, not a friend to welcome him save fiends in human shape, who tempted him in every possible fashion to spend his hard-earned wages. Too often a fixed habit of drink renders him an easy prey.
Late years, Christians are waking to the fact that they owe a duty to Jack, as their brother, and are trying to save and help him.
This story was told by the sailor to a friend:
“I am a man who would like to have a home and folks of my own, but I’ve been ten years on the water. I never married, and my old father and mother have been long dead. So when I came to a port, the only fun I knew was to get drunker than usual, and act like a beast, and be treated like a beast.
“On one long voyage we was bound to the port of New York. The only soul I knowed in that big town was an old hag that kept a filthy house for sailors. I knowed she’d drug me and take my last cent, an’ then turn me out. But I kep’ goin’ to her ’cause she called me by name. It was sort of homelike, you see.
“But on this voyage one or two of the men kep’ passin’ a card around that came from New York. At last I got it. On it was a ship, an’ a man at the wheel.
“‘That’s me,’ says I.
“Underneath was some texts hard on drunkards. That made me mad. ‘I don’t want no preachin’,’ says I, ‘because I’m that wicked I’m past savin’. Nobody don’t care for me.’
“But I turned the card over, an’ on the other side was a man’s open hand stretched out, an’ the word ‘Come.’
“That struck me hard. It was the first friendly hand held out to me since I took to sea. ‘I ain’t fit, but I’ll go,’ I says.
“When I got to port, I did go. I found a clean, comfortable house, and friends who tried to save me. They told me of Him who spent most of His time with sailors, an’ loved them. I was ashamed to ask Him to save me, I was that vile an’ wicked. But as soon as ever I asked, He answered. I think maybe it was His hand held out to me.”
Thus does God answer every cry, “Be merciful to me a sinner.”—Exchange.