cate them in
seamanship and navigation, the idea being to make them officers of their
ships as soon as they became competent. Seven boys were selected, I
being one of them.

Father furnished me with a complete outfit for sea, and a set of
navigation instruments and books. One thing I thought lacking--that was
a pipe and tobacco. The sea-chest was sent to father's store. My younger
brother, Charlie, was anxious to know what sailors wore at sea, so he
examined the contents of the chest, and found a paper of cheap tobacco
and a two-cent pipe.

Charles--"Oh, father, George smokes!"

Father--"Why, George, do you use tobacco?"

George--"No, father, I never have done so yet; but I always hear that
sailors smoke at sea."

Father--"Well, George, throw that stuff away and come with me."

He then took me to a cigar-store, and bought me twelve half-pound papers
of fine Turkish tobacco, some pipes, and a box containing one hundred
fine cigars. What was the result? I never used a pipeful of that
tobacco, nor a cigar, and not until years afterward, when I was
forty-eight years old and in Joliet Prison, did I acquire the tobacco
habit, first by chewing it and then by smoking pipes made out of tool
handles on holidays--our only opportunity in that "hell-hole."

My father's friends had a full-rigged ship ready for sea at that time;
there were the captain, first, second, and third mates, and a crew of
about sixteen men of all nationalities. We seven boys were shipped on
board as apprentices, at the rate of four dollars a month. The voyage
was to be to Batavia, Island of Java, for a part cargo of coffee; from
there to Shanghai, China, for the balance of the cargo, the new crop of
tea, which would be ready for us by the time of our arrival.

The ship--we'll call her the Prospero--was to go out in ballast, as they
had no cargo to send out. Three passengers were to go with us--a man,
his sister, and her child. The sister was the wife of a pilot and opium
smuggler in the Chinese waters. Ten kegs, containing five thousand
Mexican dollars each, were also sent on board to be delivered to the
branch firm in China. The fifty thousand dollars were placed in the male
passengers' state-room, under his berth.

The ship was moved out from the dock, and anchored in the East River.
Next morning, early, a large tugboat came alongside the ship. On board
the tugboat was a large party, invited by the firm to have a pleasure
trip while towing the sh