Never shall I forget my emotions on first ascending the side of the ship, in which I commenced my career as a sailor. It was just about the time when Nelson and the Nile was the universal theme of conversation; our theatres echoed to the shouts of “Rule Britannia,” and the senate-house rang with plaudits for the achievements of naval valour. But ah! how few who rejoiced in the triumphs of victory, gave one thought to the hardships, privations, and oppressions under which the gallant seaman laboured. Boy-like, I thought it was a jovial life; and when standing on the deck, with the British ensign floating at the peak, and the bull-dogs (cannon) peeping from their port-holes, I felt, “ay, every inch a hero.” Besides, there was my handsome uniform, with bright gilt buttons bearing the impress of the anchor, and my dirk, just long enough to spit a partridge, swinging like a cook’s skewer by my side, and a leathern belt with two fierce lions’ heads in front, and that summit of a school-boy’s ambition, the cocked hat and gold rosettes. What child of twelve years could resist the temptation! So I e’en kissed my poor mother, who used to compare the rattling of the rain, as it ran down the spout into the water-butt, to the roaring of the waves, and for whom gilded buttons and cocked-up hats had no charms,--shook my father by the hand, as he gave me the bill for my outfit, to make me (by calculating the expense) more careful of my clothes,--threw my arms round the neck of my weeping sister, who slyly thrust something into my waistcoat pocket, which I afterwards found was all her own private little store of cash,--and away I started with glory in my eye, to leave “home, sweet home” far, far behind me. The ship which I was going to join, was a fine dashing frigate, commanded by a friend of my father’s friend, to whom I received the most handsome recommendations. I say friend of my father’s friend, for such he was represented to me; but the fact is, my worthy dad was a freeman of no contemptible borough, besides holding a considerable influence over a certain number of _independent_ voters, and one of the candidates, whilst canvassing for the general election, had declared that “I was cut out for a sailor,”--that “he had interest at the Admiralty,” and made no doubt that by diligence and attention I should soon carry the “red flag at the fore.” I thought so too; but what the “red flag at the fore” meant, I was just as ignorant as I was of cuckoo-clock making. Nevertheless, it sounded well, the candidate became an M. P., and I was sent on board a stranger amongst strangers, and about as much patronised as a widow’s pig upon a village green.