Perhaps, the most marked difference between American merchant ships and those of other nations was in regard to the use of wine and spirits. On board British ships grog was served out regularly to the men before the mast, and the captain and officers were allowed wine money. Nothing of this sort was permitted on American vessels. Robert Minturn, of the firm of Grinnell, Minturn & Co., in his evidence before a parliamentary committee in 1848, stated that teetotalism not only was encouraged by American ship-owners, but actually earned a bonus from underwriters, who offered a return of ten per cent of the insurance premium upon voyages performed without the consumption of spirits. On board the packet ships and other vessels which carried passengers, there was always wine on the captain’s table, but the captain and officers rarely made use of it. The sailors were allowed plenty of hot coffee, night or day, in heavy weather, but grog was unknown on board American merchant ships. In those days, after a New York clipper had finished loading, it was the custom for her to drop down the East River and anchor off Battery Park, then a fashionable resort, where she would remain for a few hours to take her crew on board and usually to ship from five to ten tons of gunpowder, a part of her cargo that was stowed in the main hatch, to be easily handled in case of fire. Tow-boats were not as plentiful in New York harbor as at present, and unless the wind was ahead or calm, the clippers seldom made use of them, for with a leading breeze these ships would sail to and from Sandy Hook much faster than they could be towed. One of the clippers getting under way off Battery Park was a beautiful sight, and an event in which a large part of the community was interested. The people who gathered at Battery Park to see a clipper ship get under way, came partly to hear the sailors sing their sea songs, or chanties, which were an important part of sea life in those days, giving a zest and cheeriness on shipboard, which nothing else could supply. It used to be said that a good chanty man was worth four men in a watch, and this was true, for when a crew knocked off chantying, there was something wrong--the ship seemed lifeless. These songs originated early in the nineteenth century, with the negro stevedores at Mobile and New Orleans, who sung them while screwing cotton bales into the holds of the American packet ships; this was where the packet sailors learned them. The words had a certain uncouth, fantastic meaning, evidently the product of undeveloped intelligence, but there was a wild, inspiring ring in the melodies, and, after a number of years, they became unconsciously influenced by the pungent, briny odor and surging roar and rhythm of the ocean, and howling gales at sea. Landsmen have tried in vain to imitate them; the result being no more like genuine sea songs than skimmed milk is like Jamaica rum.