With one desperate effort, however I sprang by the commissioner, and was up the ladder like a cat. I was seized at the top to be handed back again, and as I was about to make a determined resistance, the commissioner came up and kindly released me, and after a gentle reprimand for placing him in such danger, I was permitted to remain on board and to be launched in the _Prince of Wales_; having got on board more than an hour after all other communication had been cut off from her: and I obtained this gratification in the presence of thousands, who hailed the success of my daring perseverence by giving me _three cheers_. This was the first act of my life that gained me the cheers of a large multitude, and I was not a little proud of the compliment. I believe there were upwards of a thousand persons on board, and I was struck with astonishment at the stupendous magnitude of a ship of war of the first rate. On the larboard side of this magnificent specimen of the wooden walls of old England, sat the venerable monarch George the Third with his Queen and their fine family of Princesses in all their pride and beauty, two or three of them at that time being remarkably fine young women. I believe they were accompanied by one of the princes, and on the side of the king stood the victorious hero of the day, Lord Howe, commonly called by the sailors, _Black Dick_. In a few minutes, unknown and unobserved by me, the signal was given, and she glided almost imperceptibly from the stocks into the middle of the harbour, thus riding most majestically dignified in the midst of applauding and admiring myriads who hailed her progress with enthusiastic cheers; the king, the queen, and the princesses all waving their handkerchiefs. Such was the beauty of this launch, and such was the skill with which it was accomplished that the only sensation which I felt was, that the other ships, that were along side of us, appeared to move gently from us. A boat now came alongside of her, being hailed by a party, of which the late John Weeks, who then kept the Bush at Bristol, was one, and he began to descend[9] when a thought struck me, that as I was the last person, except the commissioner of the Dock-yard, who came on board, so I should like to be the _first_ out of her; and the thought was no sooner conceived than I put it in execution.