Whenever he flogged the men, which he was constantly doing, he never failed to upbraid them with ingratitude, and the indulgences which they received from him.

“By G——­d, there is no man-of-war in the service that has so much indulgence.  All you have to do, is to keep the ship clean, square the yards; hoist in your provisions, eat them; hoist your grog in, drink it, and strike the empty casks over the side; but Heaven itself would not please such a set of d——­d fat, lazy, discontented rascals.”

His language to the officers was beyond any thing I ever could have supposed would have proceeded from the mouth of a human being.  The master, one day, incurred his displeasure, and he very flippantly told the poor man to go to h——.

“I hope, Sir,” said the master, “I have as good a chance of going to Heaven as yourself.”

“You go to Heaven!” said the captain, “you go to Heaven!  Let me catch you there, and I will come and kick you out.”

This was, indeed, shewing how far he would have carried his tyranny if he could.  But our feelings are relieved from any violent shock at this apparent blasphemy, when we recollect that the poor man was an atheist; and that his idea of Heaven was that of a little parlour at the Star and Garter, with a good fire, plenty of grog, and pipes of tobacco.

He kept no table, nor did he ever drink any wine, except when he dined with us; but got drunk every night, more or less, on the ship’s spirits, in his own cabin.  He was always most violent in the evening.  Our only revenge was laughing at his monstrous lies on Sunday, when he dined with us.  One night, his servant came and told the midshipman of the watch, that the captain was lying dead drunk on the deck, in his cabin.  This was communicated to me, and I determined to make the best use of it.  I ran down to the cabin taking with me the midshipman of the watch, the quarter-master, and two other steady men; and having laid the water-drinker in his bed, I noted down the date, with all the particulars, together with the names of the witnesses, to be used as soon as we fell in with the admiral.

The next day, I think he had some suspicion of what I had done, and it had nearly been fatal to me.  It was blowing a fresh trade wind, and the vessel rolling very deep, when he ordered the booms to be cast loose and re-stowed.  This was nothing short of murder and madness:  but in spite of every remonstrance, he persisted, and the consequences were terrible.  The lashings were no sooner cast off, than a spare top-mast fell and killed one of the men.  This was enough to have completed our mischief for the day; but the devil had not done with us yet.  The booms were secured, and the men were ordered to rattle the rigging down, which, as the vessel continued to roll heavily, was still more dangerous, and, if possible, more useless than the former operation.  He was warned of it, but in vain; and the men had not