As I knew I must go to sea, as soon as the accounts were balanced, I began to think a little seriously of my prospects. Dissipation had wearied me, and I wanted to go a voyage of a length that would prevent my falling soon into the same course of folly and vice. I had often bitter thoughts as to my conduct, nor was I entirely free from reflection on the subject of my peculiar situation. I might be said to be without a friend, or relative, in the world. "When my hat was on, my house was thatched." Of my father, I knew nothing; I have since ascertained he must then have been dead. My sister was little to me, and I never expected to see her again. The separation from all my old lakers, too, gave me some trouble, for I never met with one of them after parting from Barnet and Mallet, with the exception of Tom Goldsmith and Jack Reilly. Tom and I fell in with each other, on my return from St. Domingo, in the streets of New York, and had a yarn of two hours, about old times. This was all I ever saw of Tom. He had suffered a good deal with the English, who kept him in Kingston, Upper Canada, until the peace, when they let him go with the rest. As for Reilly, we have been in harbour together, in our old age, and I may speak of him again. Under the feelings I have mentioned, as soon as the looks of my landlord let me know that there were no more shot in the locker, I shipped in a South Sea whaler, named the Edward, that was expected to be absent between two and three years. She was a small vessel, and carried only three boats. I got a pretty good outfit from my landlord, though most of the articles were second-hand. We parted good friends, however, and I came back to him, and played the same silly game more than once. He was not a bad _landlord_, as landlords then went, and I make no doubt he took better care of my money than I should have done myself. On the whole, this class of men are not as bad as they seem, though there are precious rascals among them. The respectable sailor landlord is quite as good, in his way, as one could expect, all things considered.