ring that
time were fixed on twelve sail of the line ready for sea. As I had never
seen a line of battleship, I was much struck with their noble and imposing
appearance, and I imagined everybody who served on board them must feel
pride in belonging to them. After a severe pull we got alongside as the
boatswain and his mates were piping to dinner. I followed the elder
midshipman up the side, the other came up after me. On reaching the
quarter-deck we made our bows, when I was introduced to the second
lieutenant, who had the watch on deck. He asked me some indifferent
questions, and sent for one of the master's mates to give orders
respecting my hammock. The first lieutenant, an elderly, weather-beaten,
gentlemanly looking person, now came on deck. I had a letter for him from
my sister's husband-elect, which I gave him. After reading it he asked me
how I had left my friends, and before I could answer the question I heard
him say to the second lieutenant, "What the devil do they send such
delicate boys into the Service to be knocked on the head for?--much better
make civilians of them." Then turning to me, "Well, youngster," said he,
with a good-humoured smile, "you'll dine in the gun room with us at three
o'clock." He then sent for the gunner, and requested him to take me into
his mess, who grinned assent. This last was a square, broad-shouldered
Welshman, with an open countenance, and of no little consequence. I
descended to his cabin, which was under water, and I could, when in it,
distinctly hear that element bubbling like a kettle boiling as it ran by
the ship's side above our heads. I found this said cabin not too large for
three of us, as the surgeon's mate was an inmate as well as myself. Its
dimensions were about eight feet by six, and when we were at table the boy
who attended us handed everything in we wanted by the door. In a few days
I was quite at home with the mids; some of them began spinning tough yarns
respecting the hardships of a sea life--what a horrible bore it was to keep
night watches, or any watch at all, and you are sure, said one of them, to
catch the fever and ague after you have been four hours walking under the
draught of the mizzen stay-sail; and, added another, to be mast-headed for
three hours with your face to windward by those tyrants, the second and
third lieutenants. They both ought to be turned out of the Service for
tyranny and oppression, and as to the last he does not know how to put t