"Here the worthy man took off his large spectacles, gave them a wipe, and put them on again, while he finished his tea. 'Before this deplorable dispensation,' continued he again, 'he was on the point of revealing to me a great scheme at once for the enlightenment, I believe, of that benighted land, and for more lucrative support to those engaged in it. I fear, gentlemen, it was enthusiasm--but I have grounds for thinking that our departed friend has left in this vessel many packages of volumes translated into several dialects of the great Hindoo tongue--not omitting, I am convinced, the best of books.' 'Where?' exclaimed several of the cadets, rather astonished. '_Well!_ poor Snout can't have been such a bad fellow, after all!' 'All hum!' said the writer, doubtfully, 'depend upon it. I should like now to have a peep at Jonathan's bales!' 'I myself have thought also,' said the missionary, 'it would gratify me to look into his apartment--and were it permitted to use one or two of the volumes, I should cheerfully on our arrival in Bom----' 'Come along,' said the cadets--'let's have a look!--shouldn't wonder to see Daniel beside his lion yet, within! or hear "Guess I ain't."' 'My young friends,' said the missionary, as we all went along the lighted passage, 'such levity is unseemly'; and indeed the look of the state-room door, fastened outside, as the steward had left it before the gale came on, made the brisk cadets keep quiet till the lashing on it was unfastened--'twas so like breaking in upon a ghost. However, as it chanced, Mr Snout's goods had got loose during her late roll, and heaped down to leeward against the door--so, whenever they turned the handle, a whole bundle of packages came tumbling out of the dark as it burst open, with a shower of small affairs like so many stones after them.
"'What's all this?' exclaimed the cadets, stooping to look at the articles by the lamp-light, strewed as they were over the deck. The reverend gentleman stooped, too, stood straight, wiped his spectacles, and fixed them on his nose, then stooped again; at length one long exclamation of surprise broke out of his mouth. They were nothing but little ugly images done in earthenware, painted and gilt, and all exactly the same: the writer dived into a canvas package, and there was a lot of a different kind, somewhat larger and uglier. Everyone made free with a bale for himself, shouting out his discoveries to the rest. 'I say, Smythe, this is Vishnu, it's marked in the corner!' 'I say, Ramsay, here's Brahma!' 'Ha! ha! ha! if I haven't got Seeva!' 'I say, what's this though?' screamed a young lad, hauling at the biggest bale of all, while the missionary stood stock upright, a perfect picture of bewilderment, '_Lo!_' being all he could say. The lad had lighted on a gross or so of hideous gentlemen and ladies with three heads and five arms, packed nicely through each other in cotton, but inside the state-room. At this last prize, however, the poor missionary could stand it no longer. 'Oh! oh!' groaned he, clapping his hand to his head, and walking slowly off to his berth; while, as the truth gleamed on the cadets and us, we sat down on the deck amidst the spoil, and roared with laughter like to go into fits, at the unfortunate Yankee's scheme for converting India.[19] I had found the American by no means to my fancy as a berth-mate, so, after some dealings with the steward, I not only had secured a pretty comfortable berth for my poor friend Westwood, but one for myself. This had been, in short, soon afterwards managed, with the help of some shifting among the best-natured of the young cadets.
