Page:Memorials of Capt. Hedley Vicars, Ninety-seventh Regiment by Marsh, Catherine, 1818-1912.djvu/119

110 never spoke on religious subjects before: and I believe that in many a heart there is implanted a desire for that which the world cannot give. Some of them will not only listen attentively to what refers to their eternal welfare, but seem most anxious to renew the subject. God grant that this time of trouble and excitement may be made the means of awakening careless hearts, and leading them to Christ.

"June 1. — We are now in Malta Harbor, and expect to leave for the Piræus in an hour's time. A French frigate passed us this morning, the men turned up and cheered her most heartily, to which the Frenchmen responded as cordially."

" — By God's mercy we have at length reached our destination. The Orinoco let go her anchor about three o'clock this afternoon. I got up very early this morning and went on deck. On either side of us was high, rocky land, and here and there were several islands, barren and uncultivated. We steamed past Athens; it is situated on the slope of a hill, with high mountains stretching away on both sides. As we kept out a considerable distance from land, we could not distinguish much. In an hour we entered the harbor of the Piræus, and here the scene that presented itself was very novel. We had scarcely anchored, when the rigging of the Leander, a British frigate, was swarming with her crew, who welcomed us with loud hurrahs; answering cheers pealed from a thousand throats, and scarcely had they died away, when the band of the French flag-ship, the Gomer, struck up 'God save the Queen,' and the men clustered like bees in the rigging, waving their straw caps, and cheering most heartily Vive l'Empereur sounding plain and distinct from the quarter-deck of the Orinoco, was the