CHAPTER V.
DR. JOHNSON, who knew little about jails and less about ships, said that "being in a ship is being in a jail with a chance of being drowned." To the man who had spent three years in penal servitude, the deck of the Gazelle was the illimitable world of freedom. Captain Gifford was a kindly man. In Henry Hathaway, O'Reilly found a loving friend and messmate, who gave the half of his little state-room and the whole of his big heart to the young Irishman. The friendship thus contracted on board the Gazelle lasted throughout life. On O'Reilly's part it was reinforced by an undying sense of gratitude for his freedom, twice conferred, and his life once saved, by the generous American sailor.
Hathaway had what, to a noble nature, is the best of reasons for loving O'Reilly, the right of a benefactor. He had helped him to escape from bondage, he was yet to protect him from recapture, and he had saved him from death itself.
Here is the story of the last-named good deed, as modestly told by Hathaway, and as I have heard it confirmed from the grateful lips of O'Reilly.
