“In 1764—eleven years before the beginning of the war, you will remember—the British man-of-war ‘Maidstone’ lay in the harbor of Newport. It was a time of peace, and the officers had nothing to do; so they amused themselves sending out press-gangs to seize any luckless American sailor who happened to be on shore, and force him into his Majesty’s service aboard their vessel.
“The life on board a British man-of-war was a dreadful one in those times, for any sailor; the cat-o’-nine-tails was flourished so often, and for such slight offenses, and even a boy midshipman could order a poor fellow to the grating to have his back cut to ribbons.
“So no wonder American sailors dreaded being forced into it; they had no peace of their lives with those press-gangs roaming the streets in search of them every night, and breaking into the taverns where a group of them might be smoking and chatting together, to seize and carry them off.
“But the incident I was going to speak of was this: One day a brig came sailing up the bay into the harbor of Newport. She had been on a long voyage—to the west coast of Africa—and the poor fellows aboard of her were just wild with joy to think they had reached home at last and were going ashore presently to see their mothers and wives and sweethearts, and all the rest of their dear ones they had been separated from so long, and who had crowded on the dock to watch the brig coming in.
“Oh, I can imagine how they felt! for I remember how glad we always were when papa’s vessel came in from a long voyage, and we knew that he’d be with us presently; and so I know something of how terrible, how perfectly unbearable, it must have seemed to them, when just as their ship was anchored, a couple of longboats from the man-of-war came pulling up alongside of the brig, and two or three officers and a lot of sailors climbed on board, and the head one ordered the American captain to call his men aft, saying ‘His Majesty has need of a few fine fellows for his service.’
“It was bad enough when they thought he was going to take some of them, each poor jackie fearing he might be the unfortunate one, yet hoping he might not; but just think of it! the officer ordered every one of them to go below and pack up his traps.
“The American captain expressed his astonishment and indignation, saying that the poor fellows were just home from a long voyage and hadn’t seen their families yet. But it did no good; every man jack of them was carried off to the man-of-war and forced to serve aboard of her.
“It was such acts of tyranny as this that drove the colonies to rebel, and finally to be determined to be free and independent.”
“And that drove them into the war of 1812, too,” said Lulu, “Oh, the States, I mean; they were not colonies then, though the British did not seem to have found it out.”
“It was a plucky little nation to declare war with England,” again remarked Albert good humoredly. “I don’t know how they ever got up courage to pit their twenty vessels against her thousand.”