On the other side of the wharf was the sailing-ship _Orient_, the first of her name and a clipper of renown. The officers and men of that craft considered themselves very superior beings to those who had not the good fortune to sail under the blue St. Andrew’s Cross; but they in their turn were looked down upon by the men sailing in the ships of Green, Dunbar, Wigram & Smith. In those days it would have required a very careful M.C. to give the varying grades of the merchant services their due order of precedence. We were met by a very dark, handsome man who we were told was one of the owners of the vessel, and one of the first remarks he made to me after the ceremony of introduction had been gone through was on the iniquity of my wearing kid gloves. Needless to say, I immediately disclaimed any intention of doing so in the future, being fearful that so pernicious a habit should already have prejudiced my chances of forming one unit of the ship’s company of so particularly correct a craft. Let me here say that the last time I met that gentleman he was bowed in stature and quite white on the figurehead; it was at the Trinity House, and this time we foregathered on equal terms. I reminded him of the particular incident and he was much amused. I regret that he has now joined the majority, leaving behind him a name that will be long remembered for good and philanthropic work wherever seamen are concerned. I refer to Captain David Mainland. My first doubts were raised when I met the second mate, who seemed to be what I should now describe as a particularly “hefty” personage. He was not wearing any elaborate uniform, in fact he wore neither coat nor waistcoat, and was very busily engaged in assisting to take in stores and stow them away down a hatchway in the after part of the cabin, a receptacle known as the lazarette. For many months afterwards that place to me was one of discomfort, for it was also the sailroom, and to one not accustomed to the smell of “below decks” the work of stowing and re-arranging canvas was not agreeable. It was, however, particularly the sort of operation to which a raw and unskilled hand could be usefully turned, and accordingly there fell to my lot a good deal of it. Immediately behind this hatchway were two staterooms, so called, fine airy cabins, one of which was the abode of Captain Hole, whose acquaintance it was now my lot to make. Let me try and describe him. He was a man of more than average height and enormous chest measurement; his face was not so weather-beaten as might have been expected, but it was one mass of freckles, and was surmounted by sandy hair and fringed with whiskers of the same colour. His hands were mighty and possessed enormous power, as I was to discover later. There was withal a bluff _bonhomie_ about the man that was attractive in its way, and to do him justice I think he tried to behave as well as he could, but he was the natural product of a hard school.