Steve. Tobacco; will you have a chew?
Capt. No, I thank you; I don’t chew.
Steve. You don’t? Well you are the first sailor I ever saw who didn’t chew.
Capt. I say, messmate, give us a chew. (Aside.) If sailors chew this, I can.
Sam. Don’t, uncle, don’t chew that horrid stuff; it’ll make you as sick as a horse.
Capt. Shiver my timbers, nevy, what’s the use in being a sailor, if you don’t do as sailors do? Give us another chew, messmate. Thank ye. You must know, messmate, that the “Jemima Matilda,” of which I am the skipper, left the harbor of Dismaltown on the second of July for a trip to Puddock.
Sam. With a cargo of onions.
Capt. We hauled off from the wharf wing and wing.
Sam (aside). It takes a pretty good sailor to put a sloop wing and wing.
Capt. As the wind freshened, we put more sail on the mizzenmast, and took a reef in the capstan, and set a hen-coop on top of the caboose, as a look-out. Then came on a perfect hurricane. We were within the latitude of forty-two degrees below zero, when I went below to take an observation. I hadn’t been gone long before there was a cry from the look-out of “There she blows!” I rushed on deck, and sure enough it did blow strong from the nor-nor-east, nor-east-by-nor, and the ship was nearly on her bulkheads. The crew clung around me and entreated me to save the ship. I alone was calm. I had all the heavy furniture of my cabin, consisting of a pine table, a musquito netting, and a looking-glass, brought up and consigned to the waves; but all in vain. Desperation nerved my arm, and seizing a hatchet, I rushed abaft the hen-coop, and with one terrific blow cut away—