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we showed that a rapid recovery from illness might be due to other causes
than direct interference with cosmic order. It might have been put into the
captain's heart to navigate in that course and to perform those acts of
seamanship which proved links in a chain that led to eventual success. A
very small matter would suffice to make a great difference in the end. A
vessel navigated by a man who was a good forecaster of weather and an
accomplished hydrographer would considerably outstrip another that was
deficient in so accomplished a commander, but otherwise similarly
equipped. The perfectly instructed navigator would deviate from the most
direct course by perhaps some mere trifle, first here, then there, in order to
bring his vessel within favouring slants of wind and advantageous
currents. A ship commanded by a captain and steered by a sailor whose
hearts were miraculously acted upon in answer to prayer would
unconsciously, as by instinct, or even as it were by mistake, perform these
deviations from routine, which would lead to ultimate success.
The missionaries who are the most earnestly prayed for are usually
those who sail on routes where there is little traffic, and therefore where
there is more opportunity for the effects of secret providential overruling
to display themselves than among those who sail in ordinary sea voyages.
In the usual sea routes a great deal is known of the peculiarities of the
seasons and currents, and of the whereabouts of hidden dangers of all
kinds; their average risk is small, and the insurance is low. But when
vessels are bound to ports like those sought by the missionaries the case is
different. The risk that attends their voyages is largely increased, and the
insurance is proportionately raised. But is the risk equally increased in
respect to missionary vessels and to those of traders and slave-dealers?
The comparison between the fortune that attends prayerful and non-
prayerful people may here be most happily made. The missionaries are
eminently among the former category, and the slave-dealers and traders
we speak of in the other. Traders in the unhealthy and barbarous regions
to which we refer are notoriously the most godless and reckless (on the
broad average) of any of their set. We have, unfortunately, little
knowledge of the sea risks of slavers, because the rates of their insurance
involve the risk of capture. There is, however, a universal testimony, in
the parliamentary reports on slavery, to the excellent and skilful manner in
which these vessels are sailed and navigated, which is a prima facie
reason for believing their sea risks to be small. As to the relative risks run
by ordinary traders and missionary vessels, the insurance offices
absolutely ignore the slightest difference between them. They look to the
