Sailors, with all
their looseness of habits, are well disposed to be sincerely religious;
and when they have fair play given them, they will always, I believe,
be found to stand on as good vantage ground, in this respect, as their
fellow-countrymen on shore. Be this as it may, there can be no more
attentive, or apparently reverent auditory, than assembles on the deck
of a ship of war, on the occasion of a shipmate's burial.
"The land service for the burial of the dead contains the following
words: 'Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God, of his great mercy,
to take unto himself the soul of our dear brother here departed, we
therefore commit his body to the ground; earth to earth, ashes to
ashes, dust to dust; in sure and certain hope,' &c. Every one I am
sure, who has attended the funeral of a friend--and whom will this not
include?--must recollect the solemnity of that stage of the ceremony,
where, as the above words are pronounced, there are cast into the grave
three successive portions of earth, which, falling on the coffin, send
up a hollow, mournful sound, resembling no other that I know. In the
burial service at sea, the part quoted above is varied in the following
very striking and solemn manner:--'Forasmuch,' &c.
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