FORECASTLE AND CABIN 79 



conditions on shipboardj and on February 28, 1803, they were 

 ordered to collect three months' advance wages on behalf of 

 sailors discharged under certain stipulated circumstances, as 

 well as to employ part of the resulting fund in providing 

 for the subsistence and return passage of destitute seamen. 

 On July 20, 1840, it was made the duty of all consular offi- 

 cers to assist in reclaiming deserters. But if it appeared that 

 desertion had been caused by cruel and abusive treatment, 

 they were authorized to order the discharge of the offender 

 and to demand three months' extra pay. And again on Au- 

 gust 18, 1856, the protective and supervisory functions of the 

 consuls were emphasized and clarified in a series of provi- 

 sions which also sought to limit the influence of personal bias 

 and of private interests. These pronouncements, together 

 with minor ones of the same tenor which were made during 

 the pre-Civil War days of whaling prosperity, left no doubt 

 that the consul's office was meant to be a haven of refuge for 

 American sailors when abroad. 



There was no doubt, either, concerning the fact that it 

 was regarded in this light by the supposed beneficiaries. Fore- 

 mast hands in varying degrees of distress appealed for assist- 

 ance in such numbers that the consuls in the larger ports came 

 to look upon this phase of their duties as an onerous burden. 

 The Consular Letters are filled with complaints upon this 

 score. Two excerpts from the Liverpool correspondence are 

 typical of many other passages. In a letter written on March 

 7, 1832, to Edward Livingston, Secretary of State, the consul 

 reported that he was "Called upon constantly to mediate be- 

 tween often unreasonable Captains and unruly men — obliged 

 to protect the interests of both against harpies of Land- 

 lords and rapacious Jews, having my office constantly overrun 

 with destitute Seamen, whose stories I must listen to and (no 

 easy task) distinguish between those really deserving and the 

 hundreds of impostors that importune me from morning 'till 

 night — for each shilling doled out compelled to take tripli- 

 cate receipts." And again on October 15, 1833, the same 

 official insisted that "Scarcely a ship comes to the port, that 

 there does not exist some difference between the Master and ' 

 the Seamen, to the stories and complaints of both the Consul 



