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Thirty Years from Home; Or A Voice from the Main Deck
Thirty Years from Home Or A Voice from the Main Deck Author:Samuel Leech Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER 111. An alarm—A bootless cruise—Wreck—Quarrel between the captaiu and sailing-master—Its result—Change of commanders—Mr. Hope and the boys—Our men des... more »ert—Bloody Dick—Happy Jack—Attempted suicide— A negro runs away and is retaken—Good Friday in Lisbon—A perplexity on shore—Narrow escape from being flogged—The press-gang—Several Americans impressed—Another cruise—A terrible storm—Loss of a man—The author's sickness—Black Tom's death and burial—Another bare escape from flogging—Another change of commanders—Severity of Captain Garden's administration—A brutal sentence on an alleged thief— A man flogged through the fleet—Our drummer demands a court-martial—Its unpleasant termination— A [ue;ilioii—Danger of attempting mutiny—Change in my situation—The captain's band—Order for a new cruise. Shortly after the Christmas debauch, mentioned in the preceding chapter, news was brought to the admiral that nine French frigates were cruising on the Spanish coast: immediately, all was excitement, bustle, preparation through the fleet. The Hannibal and Northumberland, both seventy-four gun ships, the Ccesar of eighty guns, called by the sailors the Old Bull-dog, a gun brig, and some others, I forget the names, and the Macedonian, were ordered to sail in pursuit of the French. This formidable force dropped downthe river, every man composing it eagerly desiring to meet the enemy. The enterprise however was unsuccessful; after cruising in vain for several days, the admiral signalled the fleet to return Before reaching port we fell in with p. Scotch ship from Greenock, in a most perilous condition; her masts and rudder were gone, while her numerous leaks were fast gaining on the labors of the already exhausted crew at the pumps. Finding it utterly impossible to save the vessel, we took of...« less