TIGERLAND 



and being now responsible for my efficiency was allowed 

 to indulge them, and under his tuition I soon acquired a 

 knowledge of my duties. 



Unhappily, these duties brought me into daily contact 

 with my principal tormentors, the captain and the mate, but 

 by dint of close attention to my work, I escaped with an 

 average of one thrashing a week which, as my sable friend 

 observed, was " extronorary good." 



Nevertheless my life during that voyage was one of 

 daily toil and trouble, very different to the picture my 

 fancy had created of " a life on the ocean wave," and on 

 our arrival at St. John's, I took an early opportunity of 

 quitting that ship for one bound for Pensacola. Obtaining 

 leave to go on shore, I shipped on board this vessel, and 

 before my leave expired was well on my way to that 

 distant port. 



The next four years I passed in voyages between the 

 various ports of North and South America, sometimes in 

 English ships but as often under the Stars and Stripes, till 

 one day, in New York, finding an English vessel bound for 

 the East Indies, I shipped on board of her, now as an able- 

 bodied seaman or, in other words, A.B. 



We arrived in due course at Calcutta, that paradise of 

 sailors where, as I once heard an old salt say, " one could 

 get drunk for eight annas any day in the week," a sum 

 equivalent to about sixpence in these days. 



However, this rare and apparently much valued 

 privilege having no particular attraction for me, I found 

 Calcutta far inferior to many other towns I had seen. Its 

 damp, warm climate, evil-smelling streets, cockroaches, 

 big almost as mice, and other members of the insect tribe, 

 rendering it to my mind a most undesirable place of 

 residence. 



On the other hand, the river in which we lay the far- 

 famed Hughli with its crowd of shipping of every rig and 

 nation, interested me greatly, and I would sit for hours, 

 comfortably ensconced in the fore-top, watching some huge 

 vessel being towed up or down its swirling waters, recalling 

 to my mind the dreaded under-tow of which I had heard 

 much during the voyage. Little did I think then how 

 soon I should be grappling with this monster, in a desperate 

 8 



