The war-ship of fifty years ago was as different from the battle-ship of to-day as a caravel from a torpedo-boat. With half the length and a third the tonnage, the old “ship-of-the-line” had three times as many men as the modern sea-fighter. Yet, with a thousand men aboard, she had work for them all. More than two acres of canvas were to be handled, and over a hundred guns were to be served, loaded, and fired. A thousand pieces of running-gear were to be rove and manned. The huge topsails, weighing, with their yards, many tons, needed on their halyards half a hundred men. Great anchors were to be broken from their sandy holds, and the capstan-bars, double-banked, hove around to the sound of the merry chantey and deep-voiced trumpet. Homeward bound, the business of anchor-hoisting turned into a mad scene, and many a rude jest and hoarse song turned the crowded fo’c’s’le into a carnival of jollity. In matters of routine and training the crews of the American frigates differed little from those of England. The sailor-men of the United States, though newer to the work of navigating the big ships, were smart seamen, and could cross or bring down their light yards, send down their masts, or clear for action with the oldest and very best of England’s men-o’war’s-men. The ships themselves differed little in general construction. During the war of 1812, of large frigates we possessed but the “Constitution,” the “President,” and the “Constellation.” Though built upon models patterned after the accepted standards of the period, they were somewhat smaller than the British vessels and usually carried a lighter armament. Their unbroken list of victories during the war with England is remarkable when one considers what the young nation was contending against, both at home and abroad, and how little aid Congress had given the infant navy. It seems really wonderful how a large body of men, numbering from three hundred to six hundred, and later a thousand or more, could find comfort and a home from one year’s end to another in a space only two hundred feet long and fifty feet wide. But Jack is nowhere so comfortable as aboard ship. He is used to prescribed limits, and crawls into his hammock at night happy that the space is no greater. There is a companionship, he thinks, in close quarters, and he likes them. In the old ships it was a matter of great importance to provide comfortable quarters for the great crews they were obliged to carry. In England, during the first years of the century, the complement of a “Seventy-four” was five hundred and ninety, and even six hundred and forty men. Hammocks seem to have been used during the reign of Queen Elizabeth, when they were called “nets,” probably because they were made of rope-yarn.