Far different was the scene, and very different, of course, my deportment, four or five years afterwards on the same spot, when, instead of being the junior lieutenant, I was the great gun of all, the mighty master-nob of the whole party, that is to say, the captain himself.  I was then in command of the Lyra, a ten-gun sloop-of-war; and after the shaving operations were over, and all things put once more in order, I went on board the Alceste frigate to dine with my excellent friend and commanding officer, the late Sir Murray Maxwell.  Lord Amherst, the ambassador to China, was on board, and in great glee with the sight of what had been enacted before him; for although, as I have always said, these scenes are not of a nature to bear agreeable description, they certainly are amusing enough to see—­for once.

We soon sat down to dinner; and there was, of course, a great deal of amusement in telling the anecdotes of the day, and describing Father Neptune’s strange aspect, and his still stranger-looking family and attendants.  I ventured to back one of my figures against all or any of theirs, if not for monstrosity, at least for interest of another kind.  Our dripping Neptune in the Lyra was accompanied, as usual, by a huge she-monster representing Amphitrite, being no other than one of the boatswain’s mates dressed up with the main-hatchway tarpaulin for a cloak, the jolly-boat’s mizen for a petticoat, while two half-wet swabs furnished her lubberly head with ringlets.  By her side sat a youth, her only son Triton, a morsel of submarine domestic history ascertained by reference previously made to Lempriere’s Dictionary.  This poor little fellow was a great pet amongst the crew of the brig, and was indeed suspected to be entitled by birth to a rank above his present station, so gentle and gentleman-like he always appeared.  Even on this occasion, when disfigured by paint, pitch, and tar, copiously daubed over his delicate person, to render him fit company for his papa old Neptune, he still looked as if his ill-favoured parents had stolen him, and were trying in vain to disguise their roguery by rigging him up in their own gipsy apparel.

It was very nearly dark when I rowed back to the Lyra, which had been hanging for the last half hour on the frigate’s weather-quarter, at the distance of a cable’s length, watching for my return.  The wind was so light, and the brig so close, that no signal was made to heave to; indeed I had scarcely rowed under the Alceste’s stern, on my way back, before it was necessary to call out, “In bow!” The rattle of the oar on the thwarts gave the earliest notice of my approach to the people on board the little vessel, and I could hear the first lieutenant exclaim in haste, “Attend the side!  Where are the sides-men?”