340 WHALING AND FISHINO. 



" No. I want no more idlers than I've gc * 

 now." 



With this our interview closed. I told the mate, 

 who seemed a more civil man than the captain, 

 that the latter had promised to ship me. 



" Come down every two or three days and show 

 yourself to him, that he may not forget you," said 

 he, kindly, in answer. 



Meantime my last captain was making use of 

 the last vestige of power in his hands, to make 

 his crew uncomfortable. The British sailor is 

 so important an individual to the prosperity of 

 the Empire, and the British captain is so inva- 

 riably a tyrant, that it has been found necessary 

 to hedge seamen about with numerous laws, by 

 which it is supposed they are protected from the 

 evil inclinations of their superiors. These in turn, 

 having a line drawn over which they may not 

 step, take care in general to go quite up to it. 



Thus it is provided, for the protection of sea- 

 men, that they shall be paid off within ten days 

 of the time when the vessel has been made fast in 

 her dock. Accordingly, our captain told us to 

 come to the owner's office on the afternoon of the 

 ninth day, when our money would be ready for us. 



It is usual, with the regular discharge, to give 

 seamen in British vessels a "recommendation" to 

 the tenler mercies of any others who may pro- 

 pose to employ them. An American shipmaster or 

 owner thinks a man's face and carriage sufficient 

 to judge of his merits. A Briton asks first for th 



