crew is on duty, and the other half has a watch below. In case of emergency all hands are called, and then the whole crew is on duty. An exception to the four hour watch, is the dog-watch, which is two hours-when one watch is on duty from four to six, P. M., and the other from six to eight. The effect of this is to alternate the watch, so that the watch which was on duty one night from eight to twelve, is below the next night at the same hours; and so through the twenty-four hours. It was required of each mess to keep their tin pots scoured bright, and also the hoops of their mess kids, and wo betide the indolent one who was caught napping in any respect of cleanliness.

I believe I have not yet described our armament. We had a long gun amidships, (which revolved on a swivel, so that it could be discharged in any direc

tion,) and four large carronades of a side. We had muskets, boarding-pikes, and boarding-hatchets, in abundance, and were frequently exercised to their use. Some of the least effective of the crew in other respects, were exercised as marines; and these were placed under the charge of the writer. I did my best to discipline and instruct this little army; but whether it was my deficiency in the qualities which belong to a commander, or that the soldiers were incapable of receiving instruction, I know not; but this I do know, that my army was the butt of ridicule to the rest of the crew; and the appellation of the awkward squad,' stuck to us like a burr. I have been more fortunate since, having attained to the rank of captain in the militia; and have been thought to bear my blushing honors' tolerably well.

For two days after our sailing, the wind was fair and the weather serene, and our little vessel dashed rapidly over the waters. On the third, the wind blew high from the S. W., with indications of a storm; and our captain, with an experienced judgment, predicted a gale that would try the capacity of the schooner. Nor was his prophecy at fault, for the wind increased, and, changing to the N. W., realized all that I had ever read or heard of gales at sea, and more than realized any conception 1 had formed of the reality of such a scene, and of the capability of any creation of man's art for enduring the prodigious rage of such an elemental war. Such creaking of masts; such a jar of rigging; such a staving of bulwarks; such a rolling of our little vessel, confounded all my ideas of hearing and motion. I had witnessed what were called gales of wind before, but they were but gentle breezes compared with this. For eight days, the storm raged; and during all this time, the raw hands among us thought ourselves to be on the very verge of foundering, as each successive wave dashed over us, and I more than suspected that the oldest

and most experienced seamen thought themselves nearer this catastrophe than was pleasant to contemplate.

There is not the least degree of exaggeration in terming such waves mountain high." There was a fearful excitement in viewing them as they came thundering on, and dashed against our little schooner with a force that threatened, each time, to bear us down to the unfathomable abyss of the ocean. Not less fearful was the roaring of the tremendous thunder, and the vivid flashings of the lightning, as they lit up the murky darkness of the atmosphere. It was almost impossible to keep the deck, and our situation below was not much better or drier than on deck. Our cook and his assistants were driven from the galley, and we had to get the cooking apparatus and our side guns below, to ease the vessel. Our appetites were not lessened by the storm, and we made fearful ravages on the litthe stock of raw bacon, and not trifling ones on the larger store of salt pork.

Our schooner barely withstood the storm; and as all things, even storms, must, sooner or later, have an end, on the ninth day, the gale was sufficiently

abated to enable us to repair damages, which were neither few nor small. This done, we made sail again for the sunny regions of the tamarind and banana.

In a day or two, we fell in with and overhauled a Portuguese brig, which had been captured on its passage from New-Haven to St. Bartholomews, by the British frigate Fix, and ordered to Bermuda for trial, on the suspicion that the property was American, covered by the Portuguese flag. She was in charge of two midshipmen of the Ramillies seventy-four, and six British seamen. There was also on board, a midshipman and prize crew, whom they had taken from an American sloop, captured on the passage from New-York to Charleston, by the British schooner. Pictou.. The Portuguese brig met her at sea in a sinking condition, and took out the crew and burnt the sloop. These young scions of the royal navy came on board our schooner, and by way of showing them Yankee hospitality, we made. them welcome in copious draughts of whiskey and molasses. This beverage they seemed to relish highly, whether from its own intrinsic worth or out of compliment to their Yankee captors I cannot say; but, at any rate, increase of appetite grew so fast by what it fed on, that they were soon in a very un-. officer-like condition. They took a sudden fancy to remaining with us and going the cruise, captured probably more by our whiskey than our manners.

Our captain determined that, although we should probably obtain salvage by sending the brig to the United States, she was not worth the attempt. So he gave orders to the British officers to repair again on board their brig, which they seemed to hear with pain and obey with reluctance., However, there

was

no resisting the mandate of our skipper; and after a parting swig at the whiskey-pot, they bade us farewell, and with unsteady steps passed into our boat, which conveyed them to the brig. After they had gone, we found that they had left the brig's papers with us; so we run down to her again, and sent them on board, while the midshipmen stood on the brig's deck, casting their longing, lingering looks on our low hull, tall spars, and well-filled whiskey-pots.

bound for Halifax, with a full cargo of sugar, coffee and cotton. We put a prize-crew on board, and despatched her for the United States. She, however, unfortunately got wrecked, near Anisquam; and I have understood that much of her cargo was damaged, and some plundered. This was the only prize we took during the cruise from which we received any prize-money; and what, between damage, and wreckers, and agents, each man's share was a small one.

The next day, we captured another colonial schooner, from Antigua, for Nova Scotia. Our captain thought her not worth manning out, and ordered her men to be brought on board us, and the schooner destroyed. Our second lieutenant and a boat's crew went on board and brought away their men; at the same time bringing away a few light articles. They then returned to the prize-schooner for the purpose of destroying her. It was night-fall-a strong wind, almost amounting to a gale, was blowing, and a very heavy sea running. The officer in charge of the boat had peremptory orders not to take any more merchandize out of the prize, as our captain was apprehensive for the safety of the boat. The 'boat's crew had; however, found some rum in the schooner, and he was unable to control them. They loaded the boat with some small casks of rum, and set out to return to our vessel, leaving our lieutenant, a prize-master and two men on board the prize. They had loaded the boat so that she sat but just gunwale out of water, and when about mid-way of the two vessels she capsized.Every exertion was made to save the men that was in our power, and our captain exhibited a courage and energy which few men possess. The night had closed in around us, black and boisterous, and the whistling of the windthe confusion of the crew, and the shrieks of the poor drowning men, formed a scene of horror, which, at the time, was terrible to contemplate, and is now painful to remember.

Our prisoners were on deck, doing all that they could to aid us, for which our captain promised to liberate them on the first opportunity which should

Occur.

two were saved only by the personal intrepidity of the captain. He lashed himself by a rope to our bows and plunged overboard; breasting the waves, he struck out and grappled with one man, and brought him on board. Again, he nobly risked his own life in the same manner, and saved that of a young and favorite black lad. The captain was now too much exhausted to gain the vessel himself, but was pulled on board, holding on to the black boy, in whom life appeared to be extinet. however, by the use of proper means, restored. Rum, which had caused this catastrophe, was the means of saving one of the men; for, when grappled with, he was floating, holding on to a keg of it, and he brought it on board with him.

He was,

Our boats were all gone, and so were those of the prize; four men remained on board of her, and the storm had increased to a violent gale. We were fortunately enabled to keep in sight of each other for two days, when the gale abated. The men on board the prize constructed a raft from the booms and other spars, and on this they were drawn on board our schooner. We then threw two or three shots into her hull to sink her, and proceeded on our way.

A few days before the last storms, we crossed the tropical line. On crossing it, the usual ceremonies were gone through with on board our schooner. I say usual, because the practice was one which was never omitted; but I learn that it is now not so common on board of American vessels-and I hope that the good sense and intelligence of all masters, will lead them to do away with the cruel and barbarous practice. It is a custom more honored in the breach than in the observance.

As we drew near the line, a hoarse, rough voice hailed us, with the salutation of "Schooner ahoy! What schooner's that?" To this our captain replied, giving the name of the vessel, where from, where bound, and the name of the commander. The same rough voice then commanded us to heave-to, and he would come on board of us. The sails were then laid to the masts, and Neptune, his wife, barber, and a numerous retinue, came up over the bows, and passed along into the waist, where the captain stood ready

to welcome them on board. The oceangod and the fair Amphitrite, were rigged out in the most grotesque and fantastical manner possible. The whole was a burlesque on the description of Spencer:

mace

"First came great Neptune, with his three-forked
That rules the seas, and makes them rise or fall;
His dewey locks did drop with brine apace.
Under his diadem imperiall;

And by his side his queene with coronall,
Faire Amphitrite."

The imperial diadem was made of duck, covered with oakum; the threeforked mace was a fish spear; his majesty's robe of state was a red baize shirt, and on his shoulders were a massive pair of epaulettes, made of tarred oakum. The fair Amphitrite was a strapping great sailor, rigged out in the queerest toggery in which female grace and loveliness were ever burlesqued. The landsmen were all placed in the waist; and his majesty, with a nice discrimination, remembered the faces of all who had never been welcomed into his realm. But the old god was for once in his life in fault. It will be perceived that I had crossed the tropic and also the equator before; but my first captain was a man of too much good taste, and gentlemanly feelings, to permit old Neptune to come on board his ship. I had heard the ceremony of shaving so often described by sailors, that I was au fait to the thing; and my answers to the queries that had been propounded to me for several days before we reached the tropic, were very satisfactory. I had secured the silence of an old weather-beaten and rum-loving tar, who was with me in the ship, by giving him, during the whole cruise, my allowance of grog. I passed, therefore, for an affiliated and matriculated one.

The candidates having been selected, the process of shaving was now to commence. Our boat was placed on deck, half-filled with water, and a plank placed across it, but in a ticklish man

ner.

The candidate being blindfolded,. was conducted to, and made to seat himself on the plank, when several questions were propounded to him, which, if he was indiscreet enough to answer, as soon as his mouth was open, a brush, filled with tar, blacking, slush, and all manner of filth, was thrust in.

After they have worried their poor victim for some time in this manner, they proceeded to lather him, by smearing his face all over with the same detestable compound; and he was then scraped with a piece of iron hoop, notched to make it more effective, until his face was lacerated to such a degree that the blood oozing out, mingling with the tar and filth, gave the poor ill-used landsman a most deplorable appearance. To conclude the ceremony, one end of the plank was slipped away, and he received two or three severe duckings in the not over cleanly water.

Those who betrayed any signs of resistance or indignation, fared the worst—while those who took the thing quietly, and passed it off as a good joke, got off with a light penalty. One of our young landsmen, with a regard to the economy of his dress, which he rightly enough anticipated would not be very sacred against the lathering of the rough barber, had stripped himself all to his trowsers; but while he preserved his shirt and jacket clean, his raw hide had to suffer; for he was lathered and shaved from his head down to his waist; and it was many days before, by the application of grease, and soap and water, assisted by a stiff scrubbing brush, he got his body again in a decent plight. No one, save myself, who had not before been shaved, escaped-but some who were so liberal as to bribe high with grog, got off with very little annoyance.

Our little craft, for a while, presented the picture of a Pandemonium, in which the demons were holding a Saturnalia; and it was not until the next day, that the actors in this rude ceremony were sober enough to do duty.

After all had been thus roughly welcomed, and Neptune and his retinue had spliced the main-brace with all the grog they could get, they retired the same way they came-the royal Amphitrite as unamiably drunk, as was her loving spouse. They wished us a successful and happy cruise-and we kept on our way.

On the 25th of January, 1814, being just one month after we sailed from Portsmouth, at 5 o'clock in the morning, the word was passed from the lookout above,Sail, oh!" She was to the leeward; and as we had chased a galliott the afternoon previous, and had lost sight of her at night, in that direc

tion, we bore away, and made sail for the strange vessel, thinking it to be the same. In the indistinct light of the morning, we were not undeceived until we were within about five-miles of her. We then began to suspect, that instead of a prize, we were likely to catch a Tartar. She was a large man-of-war brig, and by her model and rig, we judged her to be an English one. We speedily hauled upon the wind and made all sail, endeavoring to show the enemy a clean pair of heels; for we had now no doubt she was an enemy, although she hoisted Spanish colors; but we had too much experience in false colors ourselves, to be deceived by them. We continued sailing closehauled, for an hour or more, using all devisable means to propel our vessel through the water; but we perceived, that, notwithstanding all our efforts, the brig was continually, though slowly, nearing us. We did not sail so well on the wind as before it; and we gradually edged off, and kept away, until we got the wind abaft. We then felicitated ourselves for some time with the hope of escape; but it was a delusive hope, and the delusion was at length dispelled. The chase still gained upon us. We were in the neighborhood of Porto Rico, and we still hoped to keep clear of the brig until darkness came on, and under its cover to escape into the harbor of St. John's. We lightened our schooner by throwing overboard all our guns, except Long Tom;' most of our provisions and water, all our small arms, irons, camboose, &c.

I was amused during these proceedings, to see one man very gravely seize and throw overboard the cook's bellows. He no doubt thought that every little helped. It was late in the afternoon when we launched over the camboose, and the coppers were full of boiling beans and pork, which had been prepared for our rations for the day; but which we had not found time to partake of.

We sawed down our plank shires, started out the wedges of our masts, and kept our sails continually_wet. But all would not do, for at 5 P. M. the brig had neared us sufficiently to commence firing on us with her bowguns. It would have been utter madness for us to think of contending with her; but our captain was determined

to die game; and there was yet some little hope that we might possibly disable her enough to give us a chance of escape. With this view, we returned her fire, from our now only remaining gun; and this was an operation of no little hazard. Our powder magazine was down in the run-the cabin above itand the companion-way, or entrance to the cabin, was covered with a slidingdoor. The magazine was necessarily opened to pass up the powder, and the scuttle or entrance to it, was almost immediately underneath the entrance to the cabin. As we slewed Long Tom' aft, and fired over our taffrail, the cabin slide would fly back every time we discharged him, and the sparks from the match and gun would fall down into the magazine. I expected every moment that the schooner would blow up; and I by no means relished the idea of such an aërial ascension. We kept two men in the magazine all the time with wet swabs, to put out the fire, and luckily escaped the explosion of our magazine.

The brig kept up a steady fire upon us till 7 o'clock; but as we were low in the water, they did not often strike us. A thirty-two pound shot came on board us at the commencement of the firing. Though nearly spent, it struck and split the side tackle block of our large gun, struck the gun, and rebounded into the lap of the deserter from the Rattlesnake who was sitting on the slide. He very coolly walked aft with it, and presented it to the captain.

At half past 6, the enemy was near enough to pour into us, volley after volley, of musketry. Our little skipper seemed to be in his glory; he ordered all but a few men to go below, to get out of the way of the musket balls, but did me the high honor to select me as one of the few to keep the deck,-a distinction for which, I am afraid. I was not very grateful. He himself kept bustling about, watching chances, giving orders, and cracking his jokes, as coolly as if he was on a mere pleasure excursion; and as if musket balls were the most harmless things in the world.

Our sails and rigging were completely cut to pieces by the musketry, but not a man was hurt. I presume, from the circumstance that we were so much below them in the water, that their balls passed over our heads. At 7 o'clock, all hope of escape departed from

the captain. The captain mounted up into the main rigging, and hailing the brig, announced our surrender, as it was too dark for them to see that we had hauled down our colors. They kept. up the fire a minute or two longer, but on being hailed again, they desisted. She was then within half pistol shot of

us.

She proved to be the British sloopof-war Heron, Wm. McCulloch commander, armed with 16 thirty-two pound carronades, and two long nines, beside a twelve pound carronade upon her forecastle, and a crew of 100 men. We were boarded by an officer, who ordered all our men but two, to proceed on board the brig. While the last boat was conveying the last of us with our baggage, to the brig, the boat capsized. We all, fortunately, escaped drowning, but our poor duds went to the bottom.

When I stood upon the Heron's deck, a prisoner of war, the checked shirt and duck trowsers which I stood in constituted my whole earthly possessions. It is a consolation to me, that I can never be much poorer than I have been. Our necessities were liberally ministered to by our own crew, who had preserved their clothes, and also by our captors. Of the kindness to myself of a young man, a midshipman of the brig, who supplied me from his own scanty wardrobe, I hope ever to cherish a very grateful remembrance.

Our treatment on board the brig was very good. The officers seemed to do all they could to promote our comfort; and instead of being exasperated at our desperate attempt at escape, they commended our little captain for it. He contrived very soon to ingratiate himself with the British captain and lieutenants, so that he was taken into the lieutenants' mess; and being a plausible, intelligent and well-informed man, gifted with an abundance of what some call modest assurance and others ill-naturedly term impudence, could tell a good story, and be by no means scrupulous as to the exact truth of it. I have no doubt that he made, for the time, a very pleasant addition to their mess.

Our lieutenants, surgeon, and myself, were invited to join the young gentlemen, as the midshipmen are called on board a man-of-war, and we passed our time very pleasantly with them; as their kindness made us almost for a time forget our captive situation.