the stern of a ship, when I heard the order ‘lay in your oars.’ Then one of the men caught hold of the end of a rope, which was thrown from the ship; and, the boat being made fast, we all scrambled up the ship’s side; and then I was hustled along to a hole in the forward part of the deck (having what looked like a box turned upside down over it), through which, now utterly bewildered, I descended, by means of a ladder, to a dark, damp, mouldy place, which was filled with the foul smells of tar and bilge-water, and thick with tobacco-smoke. This, they told me, was the ‘fo’casle,’ that is, forecastle, where lived the ‘crew,’ of which I became now painfully conscious that I was one. If there had been the slightest chance, I should have run away; but running away from a ship is a very different thing from running away from a farm.

The Romance of the Sea.

“If I had wished myself back on the farm before, how much more did I wish it now! But too late, too late, for we were all ordered up out of the forecastle even before I had tasted a mouthful of food. In truth, however, it is very likely that I was too sick with the foul odors, tobacco-smoke, and heart-burnings to have eaten anything, even had it been set before me.

“Upon reaching the deck, I was immediately ordered to lay hold of a wooden shaft, about six feet long, which ran through the end of an iron lever; and being joined by some more of the crew, we pushed down and lifted up this lever, just like firemen working an old-fashioned fire-engine. Opposite to us was another party pushing down when we were lifting up, and lifting up when we were pushing down. I soon found out that by this operation we were turning over and over what seemed to be a great log of wood, with iron bands at the ends of it, and having a great chain winding up around it. The chain came in through a round hole in the ship’s side, with a loud ‘click, click,’ and I learned that they called it a ‘cable,’ while the machine we were working was called a ‘windlass.’ The cable was of course fast to the anchor, and it was very evident to me that we were going to put to sea immediately. The idea of it was now as dreadful to me as it had before been agreeable, when I had contemplated it from the stand-point of a quiet farm, a good many miles away from the sea. But I could not help myself. No matter what might happen, my fate was sealed, so far as concerned this ship.

“We had not been long engaged at this work of turning the windlass, before my companions set up a song, keeping time with the lever which we were pushing up and down, one of them leading off by reciting a single line, in which something was said about Sallie coming, or having come, or going to come to ‘New York town’; after which they all united in a dismal chorus, that had not a particle of sense in it, so far as I could see, from beginning to end. When they had finished off with the chorus, the leader set to screaming again about ‘Sallie’ and ‘New York town,’ and then as before came the chorus. Having completely exhausted himself on the subject of Sallie, he began to invent, and his inventive genius was rewarded with a laugh which interfered with the chorus through about two turns of the windlass. What he invented I will recite, that you may see how senseless it was; and I will drawl it out very slow to imitate them. But first let me say, when they were through with this chorus, the leader put in his tongue again, inventing a sentiment to rhyme with the first, howling it out as if he would split his throat in the endeavor. This is what it all was:—

‘We’ve picked up a lubber in New Bedford town,—
Come away, away, sto-r-m along, John,
Get a-long, storm a-long, storm’s g-one along,’

‘Our lubber’s lugger-rigged, and we’ll do him brown,—
Come away, away, sto-r-m along, John,
Get a-long, storm a-long, storm’s g-one along.’

“The last sentiment about lugger-rigged lubber being done brown made them all laugh even more than the other, and caused an interruption of the chorus to the extent of at least four revolutions of the windlass; but when the laugh was over, they went at the dismal chorus with double the energy they had shown before, repeating all they had then said about ‘John’s getting along,’ and ‘storming along,’ as if they rather liked John for doing these things. Thus they went on without much variety, until I was sick and tired enough of it. The ‘lubber’ part of it was too clearly aimed at me to be mistaken; but I could not discover in it anything but nonsense all the way through to the end.

“After a while I heard some one cry out, ‘The anchor’s away,’ which as I afterwards learned, meant the anchor had been lifted from the bottom; and then the sailors all scattered to obey an order to do something, which I had not the least idea of, with a sail, and with some ropes, which appeared to me to be so mixed up that nobody could tell one from the other, nor make head nor tail of them. In the twinkling of an eye, however, in spite of the mixed-up ropes, there was a great flapping of white canvas, and a creaking and rattling of pulleys. Then the huge white sail was fully spread, the wind was bulging it out in the middle like a balloon, the ship’s head was turned away from the town, and we were moving off. Next came an order to ‘lay aloft and shake out the topsail’; but happily in this order I was not included, but was, instead, directed to ‘lend a hand to get the anchor aboard,’ which operation was quickly accomplished, and the heavy mass of crooked iron which had held the ship firmly in the harbor was soon fastened in its proper place on the bow, to what is called a ‘cat-head.’ By the time this was done, every sail was set, and we were flying before the wind out into the great ocean.

“And now you see my wish was gratified. I was in a ship and off on the ‘world of waters,’ with the career of a sailor before me,—a career to my imagination when on the farm full of romance, and presenting everything that was desirable in life. But was it so in reality when I was brought face to face with it,—when I had exchanged the farm for the forecastle? By no means. Indeed, I was filled with nothing but disgust first, and terror afterwards. The first sight which I had of the ocean was much less satisfactory to me than would have been my father’s duck-pond. I soon got miserably sick; night came on, dark and fearful; the winds rose; the waves dashed with great force against the ship’s sides, often breaking over the deck, and wetting me to the skin. I was shivering with cold; I was afraid that I should be washed overboard; I was afraid that I should be killed by something tumbling on me from aloft, for there was such a great rattling up there in the darkness that I thought everything was broken loose. I could not stand on the deck without support, and was knocked about when I attempted to move; every time the ship went down into the trough of a sea I thought all my insides were coming up. So, altogether, you see I was in a very bad way. How, indeed, should it be otherwise? for can you imagine any ills so great as these?

1st, To have all your clothes wet;
2d, To have a sick stomach; and,
3d, To be in a dreadful fright.

“Now that was precisely my condition; and I was already reaping the fruits of my folly in running away from home and exchanging a farm for a forecastle.”

The Captain here paused