DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61480#0101
INDUSTRY AND IDLENESS.
PLATE V.
THE IDLE 'PRENTICE TURNED AWAY AND SENT TO SEA.
" A foolish son is the heaviness of his mother." Proverbs, chap. x. verse 1.
Corrupted by sloth and contaminated by evil company, the idle apprentice, having
tired the patience of his master, is sent to sea, in the hope that the being removed from
the vices of the town, and the influence of his wicked companions, joined with the hard-
ships and perils of a seafaring life, might effect that reformation of which his friends
despaired while he continued on shore. See him then in the ship's boat, accompanied
by his afflicted mother, making towards the vessel in which he is to embark. The
disposition of the different figures in the boat, and the expression of their countenances,
tell us plainly, that his evil pursuits and incorrigible wickedness are the subjects of
their discourse. The waterman significantly directs his attention to a figure on a gibbet,
as emblematical of his future fate, should he not turn from the evil of his ways; and
the boy shows him a cat-o'-nine-tails, expressive of the discipline that awaits him on
board of ship; these admonitions, however, he notices only by the application of his
fingers to his forehead, in the form of horns, jestingly telling them to look at Cuckold's
Point, which they have just passed; he then throws his indentures into the water
with an air of contempt, that proves how little he is affected by his present con-
dition, and how little he regards the persuasions and tears of a fond mother, whose
heart seems ready to burst with grief at the fate of her darling son, and perhaps her
only stay ; for her dress seems to intimate that she is a widow. Well then might
Solomon say, that " a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother;" for we here behold
her who had often rejoiced in the prospect of her child being a prop to her in the decline
of life, lamenting his depravity, and anticipating with horror the termination of his evil
course. One would naturally imagine, from the common course of things, that this
scene would have awakened his reflection, and been the means of softening the rugged-
24.
PLATE V.
THE IDLE 'PRENTICE TURNED AWAY AND SENT TO SEA.
" A foolish son is the heaviness of his mother." Proverbs, chap. x. verse 1.
Corrupted by sloth and contaminated by evil company, the idle apprentice, having
tired the patience of his master, is sent to sea, in the hope that the being removed from
the vices of the town, and the influence of his wicked companions, joined with the hard-
ships and perils of a seafaring life, might effect that reformation of which his friends
despaired while he continued on shore. See him then in the ship's boat, accompanied
by his afflicted mother, making towards the vessel in which he is to embark. The
disposition of the different figures in the boat, and the expression of their countenances,
tell us plainly, that his evil pursuits and incorrigible wickedness are the subjects of
their discourse. The waterman significantly directs his attention to a figure on a gibbet,
as emblematical of his future fate, should he not turn from the evil of his ways; and
the boy shows him a cat-o'-nine-tails, expressive of the discipline that awaits him on
board of ship; these admonitions, however, he notices only by the application of his
fingers to his forehead, in the form of horns, jestingly telling them to look at Cuckold's
Point, which they have just passed; he then throws his indentures into the water
with an air of contempt, that proves how little he is affected by his present con-
dition, and how little he regards the persuasions and tears of a fond mother, whose
heart seems ready to burst with grief at the fate of her darling son, and perhaps her
only stay ; for her dress seems to intimate that she is a widow. Well then might
Solomon say, that " a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother;" for we here behold
her who had often rejoiced in the prospect of her child being a prop to her in the decline
of life, lamenting his depravity, and anticipating with horror the termination of his evil
course. One would naturally imagine, from the common course of things, that this
scene would have awakened his reflection, and been the means of softening the rugged-
24.