ter in a war of
sections. Considering the great naval names of the past, Preble, Hull,
Decatur, Bainbridge, Stewart, Porter, Perry, and Macdonough, the two
most Southern of whom came from Delaware and Maryland, this
ante-bellum assurance was, to say the least, self-confident; but
Farragut was a Southerner. The other captain of the forecastle was
less communicative, taciturn by nature; but there ran of him a story
of amusing simplicity. It occurred to him on one occasion that he
would lay under contribution the resources of the ship's small
library. Accordingly he went to the chaplain, in whose care it was;
but as he was wholly in the dark as to what particular book he might
like, the chaplain, after two or three tries, suggested a _Life of
Paul Jones_. Yes, he thought he would like that. "You see, I was
shipmates with him some cruises ago; he was with me in the main-top of
the ----."

Another forecastle intimate of mine was the boatswain, who, like most
boatswains of that day, had served his time before the mast. As is the
case with many self-made men, he, on his small scale, was very
conscious of the fact, and of general consequent desert. A favorite
saying with him was, "Thanks to my own industry and my wife's economy,
I am now well beforehand with the world." Like a distinguished officer
higher in rank of that day, of whom it was said that he remembered
nothing later than 1813, my boatswain's memory dwelt much in the
thirties, though he acknowledged more recent experiences. His attitude
towards steam, essentially conservative, was strictly and amusingly
official. He had served on board one steamer, the _San Jacinto_; and
what had pleased him was that the yards could be squared and rigging
hauled taut--his own special function--before entering port, so that
in those respects the job had been done when the anchor dropped. One
of his pet stories, frequently brought forward, concerned a schooner
in which he had served in the earlier period, and will appeal to those
who know how dear a fresh coat of paint is to a seaman's heart. She
had just been thus decorated within and without, and was standing into
a West-Indian port to show her fine feathers, when a sudden flaw of
wind knocked her off, and over, dangerously close to a rocky point.
The first order given was, "Stand clear of the paint-work!"--an
instance of the ruling passion strong _in extremis_. He had another
woesome account of a sloop-of-war in which he had gone t