ins for the captain and officers. All the rest of the ship
was filled with cargo and stores. To the masts were hung across spars,
or poles, as big as large larches, and on these were stretched the
sails, made of stout canvas. It required the strength of all the crew
to hoist one of these yards, and that of eight or ten men to roll up, or
furl, one of the larger sails. Then there were so many ropes to keep up
the masts, and so many more to haul the sails here and there, that I
thought I should never learn their names or their uses.

From the day the captain put me under charge of Mr Alder, he seemed
never so much as even to look at me, but I know that he really did not
forget me.

I had learned something about sea-life, going round from Poole to
Liverpool, so that I was not quite raw when I went on board the _Rose_.
There were two other boys who had never before been on board ship, and
as I had been a week at sea they looked on me as an old sailor. The
rest of the crew did not though, and I was told to run here and there
and everywhere by any man who wanted a job done for him. Still I had no
cause to complain. The captain was strict but just, made each man do
his duty, and the ship was thus kept in good order. I set to work from
the first to learn my duty, and found both Mr Alder and many of the men
ready to teach me. In a short time I went aloft, that is climbed up the
masts, and lay out on the yards to reef sails as well as many older
seamen. At first it seemed a fearful thing to be high up on the yards
with only a rope to hold on by, or may be only my elbows, when my hands
were wanted and to look down and see only the hard deck and the foaming
water, and to know that if I fell on the deck I should have my brains
knocked out, or into the water that I should be drowned, for at that
time I could not swim. Climbing the highest tree you ever saw is
nothing to it, for a tree is steady, and there are branches above and
below, and if you fall you may drop on the soft ground. Still I did not
think very much about it, and soon it was just the same to me, whether I
was on deck or aloft.

No man can be idle on board ship, and if a man thinks that he can sit on
a cask all day at sea, kicking his heels against it, he will soon find
out his mistake. There is always work to be done about the masts or
spars or rigging, while there is no end of ropeyarn to be spun at all
odd hours.

The two boys I have spoken of were T