“The captain ordered the purser’s steward to be put in irons directly, as well as his boy, who had stuck the light up in the cabin. The captain next went with the master-at-arms into the powder magazine, which was close to the purser’s steward’s cabin, and found the bulkhead or partition half-burnt through by the fire in the cabin! “All this mischief was occasioned by sticking a naked light upon the beam above the cabin, from whence it had fallen down and set fire to the sheets. The steward, in trying to smother it with more, had set fire to the whole bundle, which he then flung in a mass into the store-room. There was a watch kept all night near the spot. Nobody has been hurt. “I am very sorry for the purser’s steward, for he was a very good-natured and obliging man, and much liked by all of us. He gave us plums, &c. when we asked them from him. He is broke, I fear. I will give you the issue in my next letter.” This incident served, in a small way, to bring me into notice; for the very next day, to my great satisfaction, I was ordered by the first lieutenant to go in the jolly-boat, which was manned alongside, with some message to a ship which he named, lying near us at Spithead. I hesitated; and upon his asking me why I did not ‘be off,’ I replied that I did not know which was the ship in question. “Oh,” said he, looking over the gangway hammocks, “that ship with the top-gallant-masts struck.” Now, I had not the remotest idea what the term ‘top-gallant-mast struck’ might mean; but as the officer seemed impatient, I hurried down the side. The bow-man shoved the boat off, and away we rowed, making a very zig-zag course; for, though I had the tiller in my hand, I knew very imperfectly how to use it. The strokesman of the boat at last laid his oar across, touched his hat, and said, “Which ship are we going to, sir?” I answered, in the words of the first lieutenant, “the one with the top-gallant-masts struck.” “Oh, sir,” exclaimed the fellow, smiling, “we have past her some time—there she lies,” pointing astern. Round we pulled—and I was much inclined to ask the man to steer the boat; for, although my old associates, the fishermen on the coast of Scotland, had edified me a little on this matter, I found it quite a different affair to take a boat alongside a man-of-war at Spithead, in a tide’s way, from what it had been to run a cobble on the beach. Accordingly, I first ran the jolly-boat stem on, and, in trying to remedy this lubberly blunder, gave orders which had the effect of bringing the boat head and stern—which is about as wrong in seamanship, as it would be in a horseman to put his right foot into the stirrup in mounting, which, of course, would bring him with his face to the tail. Nevertheless, I crawled up the side, gave my message, and returned to report the answer. The only salutation I received from the first lieutenant was in the following words—uttered in a sharp, angry tone:—