e he asked me my rank. I informed him, when he directed his
secretary to make out my passport, and here ended much ado about nothing.

We started next morning, slept at Rouen, revisited its ancient cathedral,
which had been struck by lightning, breakfasted, and arrived at Havre,
where we remained two days, waiting for a vessel to take us across the
Channel. I viewed this town with much interest, as it had saluted the
vessels I had belonged to with several hundred shot.

We arrived at Spithead in the evening, but too late to go on shore. There
were nine of us--men, women, and squalling children--and we had the comfort
of lying on the cabin deck, there being no sleeping berths, as the vessel
was only about fifty tons, and not fitted up for passengers.

When I landed next morning I appeared to tread on air, but I could not
help laughing out aloud at the, I thought, ridiculous and anything but
picturesque dresses of the women. Their coal-scuttle bonnets and their
long waists diverted me, although I was sorry to observe in my healthy and
fair countrywomen such an ignorance of good taste. I took a hasty mutton
chop at the "Fountain," and started for London by the first stage coach.

On my arrival at dear home I found all I loved in good health. My
excellent wife and affectionate boys and girls clung round me, and I was
as happy as an innocent sucking pig, or, if my reader thinks the simile
not in place, as happy as a city alderman at a turtle feast.

A few days after my appearance at the Admiralty I was ordered to proceed
to Portsmouth, to undergo my trial for the loss of the ship, which, as a
son of the Emerald Isle would say, was no loss at all, as she was retaken
afterwards.

My sentence was as honourable to the officers of the court martial as it
was to myself. I received my sword from the President, Admiral Sir George
Martin, with a high encomium.

The days of my youth have floated by like a dream, and after having been
forty-five years in the Navy my remuneration is a hundred and eighty
pounds a year, without any prospect of its being increased. If the
generality of parents would take my advice they never would send one of
their boys into the service without sufficient interest and some fortune.
If they do, their child, if he behaves well, may die in his old age,
possibly as a lieutenant, with scarcely an income to support himself; and
if he should under these circumstances have the misfortune to have married
and