94 FAMILY ATTACHMENTS. Stewart, tan señora, tan amable, tan buena, tan cumplida!" These are subjects of which he never tires; and when, after the engagements of the day, and the recreation of company at home or abroad in the evening, we became seated in the library for varied talk, till the midnight hour, whatever the opening topic might be, whether Brazil or Peru, Europe or the Sandwich Islands, the living or the dead, the passing or the past, the closing moments always found us in the land of our birth, amidst the friends of our hearts, and never without producing an excitement that sparkled in his fine blue eye, and played on every feature of his intelligent face, while often, in anticipation of the joys of his expected return, he would start in impatience for the hour when he should once more be borne to their embraces and their love. You will not wonder that I regret to bid adieu to the society and hospitality of such a friend. There seems nothing wanting in him to a perfection of character rarely to be met, but the halo of a living and spiritual piety. To the possession of this, while he pays every respect to the services and precepts of our religion, he makes no special pretension. Our conversation often embraced the faith and the hope of the Gospel; and my prayer is that he may speedily add to every other virtue that grace which would crown the whole, and which, while it imparts fresh honour to every attainment of the passing time, casts the light of immortal glory on all that is to come. His attentions have followed me to the ship in a packet of letters to his most distinguished friends in Peru, accompanied by a note filled with salutations of interest and affection, and a regret that I could not have been allowed one more day with him to have enjoyed a pic-nic given by Lady Ponsonby. LETTER XIII. DEPARTURE FROM RIO DE JANEIRO. Organ Mountains.-Morning Scene.-Incidents on board Ship. - Case of Conversion.-Reflections. U. S. Ship Guerriere, at sea, OUR expectation of getting to sea on the 15th inst., the day first proposed, was disappointed, and we did not weigh anchor till four o'clock on the following morning. I left my cot while it was yet scarce light for the enjoyment of a farewell view of the city and bay. Every thing on land and water appeared in a freshness and brilliancy of tint, which, but for this and a few other instances I have known, I should be disposed to consider, when exhibited on canvass, a creation only of the artist's fancy. The atmosphere was so pure that the mountains on every side were presented in all the boldness of their wild and picturesque forms; and every bare precipice and projecting cliff, furrowed water-course and deep ravine, amid the forests that cover and crown them, stood in bold relief above the cultivated hills, wide lawns, luxuriant plantations, seats, and villas, at their bases. 96 ORGAN MOUNTAINS During most of our visit, heavy masses of cloud have rested over the scenery at the head of the bay in the north and west, imparting the aspect of a low country in that direction; but now, the sublime ranges of the Organ mountains were seen towering many thousand feet against the heavens at that point, in one broad wall of neutral tint; their whole contour, marked in many places by the fantastic peaks which, from a supposed resemblance to the pipes of an organ, have given to them their name, being entirely disclosed. The mantle of clouds daily spread over them was still stretched, in layers of fleecy vapour, along the shores and waters at their feet; but soon began, under the influence of the approaching sun, slowly to separate from one another, disclosing, here and there, the tufted summit of a green islet on the bosom of the bay, till the whole mass, partaking in the motion, floated upward in pearly clouds against the sides of the mountain, on which they are accustomed to hang. In the west, one broad arch of the deepest blue spread over the beautiful landscape at Praya Grande; while in the east the whole hemisphere glowed with purple, gorgeously striped with rays of gold. A mingled tint from these fell widely and richly on all below, till the sunbeams, bursting from behind the mountains, gilded the whole scene and illumed as with fire the turrets and domes and windows of the churches, convents, and villas crowning the hills, and widely scattered over the country. New effect was at the same moment given by the chiming of a thousand bells in cathedral, chapel, and AND MORNING SCENE. 97 monastery, proclaiming widely, by a merry peal, the arrival of a principal festival in the church of Rome. With the rising sun a land breeze began gently to fill our topsails, while the song in the heaving of the lead, and the plash of oars, and echoings of oar locks, from a long line of barges, sent by the French Admiral to assist our own boats in towing the Guerriere into the channel, told that we were moving. A delightful breeze springing up, we were soon hurried past the Sugar-Loaf, and in an hour or two gained a fine offing. At sunset we were fifty miles distant, but the coast in the immediate vicinity of the metropolis was still in sight, and even traces of its singular wildness and sublimity discernible. were at sea. Notwithstanding the high interest of my visit at Rio, I felt myself happy in being once more amidst my charge on board ship; and no sounds I had for many days heard came more cheeringly and welcome to my heart than those of the boatswain's pipe, calling all hands to prayers, the first evening we The retirement and quiet of my little room, with opportunities for reading and reflection, afford a grateful change after the excitement of the varied scenes witnessed on shore; and I rejoice to say, too, that the ship's company seem heartily glad to have me with them at sea again. In port I saw little of the crew except on the sabbath, and am cheered by the satisfaction they manifest in the renewal of a daily intercourse, and by the many looks and words of kindness received from them as I pass along the decks, or visit the watches in the tops. With the six or eight members of the church, and VOL. I. F others who are decidedly religious, I have frequent conversations, to encourage them by the apostolic exhortation, "Whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, if there be any virtue, if there be any praise, think on these things," and to incite them to prayer for the ungodly companions by whom they are surrounded. Besides these, there are others on board who are deeply serious; so much so as to be filled with penitential sorrow, and eagerly to seek my instruction and advice. The careless eye, it is true, might not discover them in the crowd of profane sinners in which they dwell; but our heavenly Father in mercy makes them known to me, for encouragement to be instant in season and out of season, in the avocations of my office, and in persuading men, "in Christ's stead, to be reconciled unto God." On the first day at sea, two young men, with whom I had never conversed seriously, requested that I would meet them on deck for that purpose, after the setting of the night-watch; and on the succeeding evening I had a long interview, for the first time, with a warm-hearted young Christian of the main top. He has been pious for two or three years, but diffidence kept him from making himself known to me at an earlier period. In a young Hercules of the crew, a favourite of the officers and whole ship's company, there is one too, not only "almost," but "altogether persuaded to be a Christian." For some weeks past he has shown himself to be personally interested in me; always se |