eath would be the consequence of
firing among the rioters, and prudently left it to subside with the
darkness of the night. These disorderly fellows would go round the
decks twice, with all this thundering noise and clatter, and then be
silent for about half an hour, or until they thought Mr. Osmore had
got into a doze; and then they would recommence their horrible
serenade. At length Osmore became so enraged, that he swore by his
Maker, that he would order every marine in the ship to fire in among
them; but on some of the committee observing to him that he would be
as likely to kill the innocent as the guilty, and as they were then
silent, he went off again to his cabin; but within a quarter of an
hour they begain their shocking serenade, and continued it, at
provoking intervals, all the night, so that none could sleep in the
ship.

In the morning the tender came along side, and they all went on board
of her. When they had all got in, and pushed off from the ship's side,
and while Osmore was superintending their departure, they all cried
out, _baa! baa! baa!_ until they got out of hearing. The next day he
betrayed a disposition to punish, in some way, those prisoners that
remained; but it was remarked to him, that it was utterly impossible
for any of them to stop the riot, or to keep their disturbers quiet,
and that they, themselves, were equally incommoded with him and his
family, he therefore prudently dropped the design. Although many of us
disapproved of this behavior of the men, none of us could help
laughing at the noise, and its ludicrous effects. It is a fact, that
the officers and marines of the Crown Prince prison ship, were more
afraid of the American prisoners, than they were of them. This last
frolic absolutely cowed them. One of the officers said to me, next
day, "Your countrymen do not seem to be a bloody minded set of men,
like the Portuguese and Spaniards; but they have the most, d--d
provoking _impudence_ I ever saw, in any men; if they did not
accompany it all with peals of laughter, and in the spirit of fun, I
should put them down as a set of hell-hounds." I told him that I
considered the last night's riot, not in the light of a mutiny, or a
serious attempt to wound or scratch any man, but as a high frolic,
without any real malice, and was an evidence of that boisterous
liberty in which they had been bred up, and arising also from their
high notions of right and wrong. To which the worthy Scotchman