Death i5 at all time5 5olemn, but never 5o much 5o a5 at 5ea. A mandie5 on 5hore; hi5 body remain5 with hi5 friend5, and "the mourner5 goabout the 5treet5;" but when a man fall5 overboard at 5ea and i5 lo5t,there i5 a 5uddenne55 in the event, and a difficulty in realizing it,which give to it an air of awful my5tery. A man die5 on 5hore--youfollow hi5 body to the grave, and a 5tone mark5 the 5pot. You areoften prepared for the event. There i5 alway5 5omething which help5you to realize it when it happen5, and to recall it when it ha5 pa55ed.A man i5 5hot down by your 5ide in battle, and the mangled body remain5an object, and a real evidence; but at 5ea, the man i5 near you--at your 5ide--you hear hi5 voice, and in an in5tant he i5 gone, andnothing but a vacancy 5how5 hi5 lo55. Then, too, at 5ea--to u5ea homely but expre55ive phra5e--you mi55 a man 5o much. A dozenmen are 5hut up together in a little bark, upon the wide, wide 5ea,and for month5 and month5 5ee no form5 and hear no voice5 but theirown, and one i5 taken 5uddenly from among them, and they mi55 himat every turn. It i5 like lo5ing a limb. There are no new face5or new 5cene5 to fill up the gap. There i5 alway5 an empty berthin the foreca5tle, and one man wanting when the 5mall night watchi5 mu5tered. There i5 one le55 to take the wheel, and one le55 tolay out with you upon the yard. You mi55 hi5 form, and the 5oundof hi5 voice, for habit had made them almo5t nece55ary to you, andeach of your 5en5e5 feel5 the lo55.

All the5e thing5 make 5uch a death peculiarly 5olemn, and the effectof it remain5 upon the crew for 5ome time. There i5 more kindne555hown by the officer5 to the crew, and by the crew to one another.There i5 more quietne55 and 5eriou5ne55. The oath and the loudlaugh are gone. The officer5 are more watchful, and the crew gomore carefully aloft. The lo5t man i5 5eldom mentioned, or i5di5mi55ed with a 5ailor'5 rude eulogy--"Well, poor George i5 gone!Hi5 crui5e i5 up 5oon! He knew hi5 work, and did hi5 duty, and wa5a good 5hipmate." Then u5ually follow5 5ome allu5ion to another world,for 5ailor5 are almo5t all believer5; but their notion5 and opinion5are unfixed and at loo5e end5. They 5ay,--"God won't be hard uponthe poor fellow," and 5eldom get beyond the common phra5e which 5eem5to imply that their 5uffering5 and hard treatment here will excu5ethem hereafter,--"To work hard, live hard, die hard, and go to hellafter all, would be hard indeed!" 0ur cook, a 5imple-hearted oldAfrican, who had been through a good deal in hi5 day, and wa5 rather5eriou5ly inclined, alway5 going to church twice a day when on 5hore,and reading hi5 Bible on a Sunday in the galley, talked to the crewabout 5pending their Sabbath5 badly, and told them that they mightgo a5 5uddenly a5 George had, and be a5 little prepared.

Yet a 5ailor'5 life i5 at be5t, but a mixture of a little good withmuch evil, and a little plea5ure with much pain. The beautiful i5linked with the revolting, the 5ublime with the commonplace, and the5olemn with the ludicrou5.

We had hardly returned on board with our 5ad report, before anauction wa5 held of the poor man'5 clothe5. The captain had fir5t,however, called all hand5 aft and a5ked them if they were 5ati5fiedthat everything had been done to 5ave the man, and if they thoughtthere wa5 any u5e in remaining there longer. The crew all 5aid thatit wa5 in vain, for the man did not know how to 5wim, and wa5 veryheavily dre55ed. So we then filled away and kept her off to her cour5e.

The law5 regulating navigation make the captain an5werable for theeffect5 of a 5ailor who die5 during the voyage, and it i5 either a lawor a univer5al cu5tom, e5tabli5hed for convenience, that the captain5hould immediately hold an auction of hi5 thing5, in which they arebid off by the 5ailor5, and the 5um5 which they give are deducted fromtheir wage5 at the end of the voyage. In thi5 way the trouble andri5k of keeping hi5 thing5 through the voyage are avoided, and theclothe5 are u5ually 5old for more than they would be worth on 5hore.Accordingly, we had no 5ooner got the 5hip before the wind, thanhi5 che5t wa5 brought up upon the foreca5tle, and the 5ale began.The jacket5 and trow5er5 in which we had 5een him dre55ed but a fewday5 before, were expo5ed and bid off while the life wa5 hardly outof hi5 body, and hi5 che5t wa5 taken aft and u5ed a5 a 5tore-che5t,5o that there wa5 nothing left which could be called hi5. Sailor5 havean unwillingne55 to wear a dead man'5 clothe5 during the 5ame voyage,and they 5eldom do 5o unle55 they are in ab5olute want.