The Sterling was short-handed this passage, mustering but four hands in a watch. Notwithstanding, we often reefed in the watch, though Cooper and Little Dan were both scarcely more than boys. Our mates used to go aloft, and both were active, powerful men. The cook, too, was a famous fellow at a drag. In these delicate times, when two or three days of watch and watch knock up a set of young men, one looks back with pride to a passage like this, when fourteen men and boys--four of the latter--brought a good sized ship across the ocean, reefing in the watch, weathering many a gale, and thinking nothing of it. I presume half our people, on a pinch, could have brought the Sterling in. One of the boys I have mentioned was named John Pugh, a little fellow the captain had taken as an apprentice in London, and who was now at sea for the first time in his life. We had a long passage. Every inch of the way to the Downs was tide-work. Here we lay several days, waiting far a wind. It blew fresh from the southwest-half of that summer, and the captain was not willing to go out with a foul wind. We were surrounded with vessels of war, most of the Channel Fleet being at anchor around us. This made a gay scene, and we had plenty of music, and plenty of saluting. One day all hands turned-to together, and fired starboard and larboard, until we could see nothing but a few mast-heads. What it all meant I never heard, but it made a famous smoke, and a tremendous noise. A frigate came in, and anchored just ahead of us. She lowered a boat, and sent a reefer alongside to inform us that she was His Majesty's ship----; that she had lost all her anchors but the stream, and she might strike adrift, and he advised us to get out of her way. The captain held on that day, however, but next morning she came into us, sure enough. The ships did not get clear without some trouble, and we thought it wisest to shift our berth. Once aweigh, the captain thought it best to turn out of the Downs, which we did, working through the Straits, and anchoring under Dungeness, as soon as the flood made. Here we lay until near sunset, when we got under way to try our hand upon the ebb. I believe the skipper had made up his mind to tide it down to the Land's End, rather than remain idle any longer. There was a sloop of war lying in-shore of us, a mile or so, and just as we stretched out from under the land, she began to telegraph with a signal station ashore. Soon after, she weighed, and came out, also. In the middle watch we passed this ship, on opposite tacks, and learned that an embargo had been laid, and that we had only saved our distance by some ten or fifteen minutes! This embargo was to prevent the intelligence of the Copenhagen expedition from reaching the Danes. That very day, we passed a convoy of transports, carrying a brigade from Pendennis Castle to Yarmouth, in order to join the main fleet. A gun-brig brought us to, and came near pressing the Swede, under the pretence that