“Being, however, on land, his first object was to make his residence as much like a man-of-war as possible, or rather as much like that beau-ideal of a habitation, his last frigate, the _Mermaiden_, in which he had by different prizes made above sixty thousand pounds. By that standard his calculations were regulated. All the furniture of the White House at Hannonby was adapted to the proportions of His Majesty’s ship the _Mermaiden_. The great drawing-room was fitted up exactly on the model of her cabin, and the whole of that spacious and commodious mansion made to resemble as much as possible that wonderfully inconvenient abode, the inside of a ship; everything crammed into the smallest possible compass, space most unnecessarily economized and contrivances devised for all those matters which need no contriving at all. He victualled the house as for an East India voyage, served out the provisions in rations, and swung the whole family in hammocks. “It will easily be believed that these innovations in a small village in a Midland county, where nineteen-twentieths of the inhabitants had never seen a piece of water larger than Hannonby great pond, occasioned no small commotion. The poor Admiral had his own troubles; at first every living thing about the place rebelled—there was a general mutiny; the very cocks and hens, whom he had crammed up in coops in the poultry yard, screamed aloud for liberty; and the pigs, ducks and geese, equally prisoners, squeaked and gabbled for water; the cows lowed in their stall; the sheep bleated in their pens; the whole livestock of Hannonby was in durance. “The most unmanageable of these complainers were, of course, the servants; with the men, after a little while, he got on tolerably, sternness and grog (the wind and sun of the fable) conquered them. His staunchest opponents were of the other sex, the whole tribe of housemaids and kitchenmaids abhorred him to a woman, and plagued and thwarted him every hour of the day. He, on his part, returned their aversion with interest; talked of female stupidity, female awkwardness and female dirt, and threatened to compound an household of the crew of the _Mermaiden_ that should shame all the twirlers of mops and brandishers of brooms in the county. “Especially he used to vaunt the abilities of a certain Bill Jones as the best laundress, sempstress, cook and housemaid in the navy; him he was determined to procure to keep his refractory household in some order; accordingly he wrote to desire his presence, and Bill, unable to resist the summons of his old commander, arrived accordingly....