After Jarman had finished his apprenticeship in the fishing-smack, he was for some years in a collier, during which time he was twice wrecked. And after that for seven or eight years he worked as a Ramsgate boatman, always on the look-out in rough weather, day and night, with but short intervals for sleep, for a signal of distress from the Goodwin Sands, and a call for the life-boat; and so all his training well fitted him for the post of life-boat coxswain; and when the vacancy was made by Hogben's illness, Jarman was well chosen to fill the post. For ten years he continued coxswain of the life-boat, going out in her no fewer than one hundred and thirty-two times, and helping to save between three and four hundred lives. You may see many a medal that has been well won--and that is worthily worn--by veteran soldier or sailor, but you will find few that have been better won, or that are more worthily worn, than are the four medals and a clasp that our Storm Warrior Jarman has to show as records of his brave and self-sacrificing services; or the three medals that Hogben can display on high days and holidays; or those given to Reading, the brave master of the steam-tug _Aid_, and those worn by many another gallant boatman or sailor, who, at Ramsgate, or at other stations round the coast, have done true warrior service in saving life from shipwreck. After holding his post of coxswain for ten years, Jarman found the exposure too much for him: he was out nine times in one fortnight, five times in one week; he was seized with a very severe attack of bronchitis, from which he never thoroughly recovered, and had shortly to give up going to sea, and resign his position of coxswain. He had three brothers and a nephew brought up as sailors, all of whom have been drowned; well do I remember the night when his last brother was drowned. It had been blowing a heavy gale for three days and nights, with continual snowstorms; the vessels at sea were in terrible peril: they had no help for it but to drive blindly before the gale, unable to see any of the lights or buoys which mark the sands and shoals. I had heard that a Ramsgate collier was known to have sailed from the North some days since, and could not be far off; and it was with a sad heart and deep anxiety that I lingered on the pier that afternoon watching the storm. I saw the boatmen all ready on the look-out for any signal, but I felt, as they felt, that there could be but little hope of any vessels being able to run the gauntlet of the many sandbanks in that dark storm, or of being able to make any signals heard, or seen, if they got into danger.