dy of iron very necessary
to the outfit. My cot is swinging and jerking up to the beams, as if
the lively scoundrel was some metamorphosed imp mocking at me. "Sarve
you right--what did you _list_ for?"--Very true--Why did I?--Well,
anxious as I am to close this chapter, and to close my eyes, I will tell
you, reader, what it was that induced me to go to sea. It was not to
escape the drudgery and confinement of a school, or the admonitions
received at home. The battle of Trafalgar had been fought--I recollect
the news being brought down by the dancing-master when I was at school;
but although I knew that eighteen or twenty sail of the line had been
captured, yet never having seen a vessel larger than a merchant ship at
London Bridge, I had very imperfect ideas on the subject--except that it
must have been a very glorious affair, as we had a whole holiday in
consequence. But when I returned home, I witnessed the funeral
procession of Lord Nelson; and, as the triumphal car upon which his
earthly remains were borne disappeared from my aching eye, I felt that
death could have no terrors, if followed by such a funeral; and I
determined that I would be buried in the same manner. This is the fact;
but I am not now exactly of the same opinion. I had no idea at that
time, that it was such a terrible roundabout way to St. Paul's. Here I
have been tossed about in every quarter of the globe, for between twenty
and five-and-twenty years, and the dome is almost as distant as ever.

I mean to put up with the family vault; but I should like very much to
have engraved on my coffin--"Many years Commissioner," or "Lord of the
Admiralty," or "Governor of Greenwich Hospital," "Ambassador," "Privy
Councillor," or, in fact, anything but Captain: for, though acknowledged
to be a good travelling name, it is a very insignificant title at the
end of our journey. Moreover, as the author of "Pelham" says, "I wish
somebody would adopt me."

CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.

When his pockets were lined, why his life should be mended,
The laws he had broken he'd never break more.
SEA SONG.

On his return to London, McElvina immediately repaired to the residence
of his patron, that he might enter into the necessary explanations
relative to the capture of the vessel, and the circumstances which had
produced his release from the penalties and imprisonment to which he had
been subjected by his lawless career. Previous, however, to narrating
th