“Well the storm increased, and we kept a reefin’; for you see I used to be ’bout as much of a sailor as any on ’em, and in a storm there warn’t much to be cooked till ’twas over. And I quit the caboose, and was in the riggin’ and all round the sap works till it abated. While we was a takin’ a double reef on the main sail of the mizzen mast, there was a boy by the name of Henry Thomson, the captain’s boy, who went up aloft with an old sailor, to larn to take a reef-plat, and by misfortune, one of the foot-ropes gin way, and the little feller fell and struck on the quarter-deck railin’, and left part of his brains there, and his body went overboard; and we was agoin’ so fast, we couldn’t ’bout and get him, and we had to leave the poor feller to find companions in the deep. Oh! he was a noble boy and I felt so arter it, that I always thought of this varse of an old sailor song.
‘Days, months, years, and ages, shall circle away,
And still the vast waters above thee shall roll,
Earth loses thy pattern, for ever and aye,
Oh! sailor boy! sailor boy! peace to thy soul.’
“Well we sailed on, and the storm increased till midnight; and oh! how the ocean did look! It seemed as though it was all a blaze of fire, and the ship couldn’t keep still one second. She pitched and tumbled about like a drunken man, and yit every thing held as strong as iron; and so ’bout one o’clock at night, the storm passed off ’bout as quick as it had come, and as soon as any light appeared in the heavens, the captain says, ‘cheer up boys! the storm is agoin’ over and all hands to bunk, only the watch.’
“In the mornin’ it was as clear and pleasant as clear could be, only the sea was dreadful rough; for you know it takes the sea a good while to git calm arter a storm; but we gits breakfast and she grows kind’a calmish, and then the captain comes on deck and tells one of the hands to go and git a canvass sack and sow it up, and put a stick in it, and a cannon ball at each end; and then he orders a plank lashed to the side of the ship, with one end slantin’ down to the water, and calls ‘all hands ‘tention,’ and then asks, ‘is there any body aboard that feels as though he could pray?’ And it was as still as death, and all looked at one another, and nobody answered; for you see in all that company of ’bout fifty, nobody could pray to his God. And all was awful, for I tell ye what ’tis Domine, it’s a pretty creepy feelin’ gits hold on a body, if they knows that nobody round ’em can pray! ☜
“But in the suspense there steps out an elderly English lady, and she said ‘Let us pray! Oh! thou who stillest the waves, &c.’ And so she went on and if she didn’t make the best prayer I ever heard afore or since, and she made a beautiful address to us, and she did talk enough to move the heart of a stone, and with tears in her eyes; and she reproved us for swearin’ so. And while she was a talkin’ and prayin’ so, there lay the like of that beautiful boy cold in death, and I tell ye it made us cry some and feel a good deal. Well we made as though we put Henry in that sack, and put him on the plank, and let him slide off into the ocean, and when he sunk it seemed as though my heart went into the sea arter him.
“Well the spot where his brains lay there on the deck, stayed there as long as I stayed aboard that ship; and I used to stand there and watch it at evenin’, and cry and cry; and I guess if all the tears I shed had been catched, they’d a filled a quart cup; but I couldn’t help it, for he was a noble boy, and I loved him like a brother. But we sailed on and left Henry behind us, and the thoughts on him sometimes checked our glee and sin, but only for a little while, and all on board soon forgot him, only me. But oh! how I did love that boy. ☜
“Well we made Gibralter in thirty-six days from New York, and as we lowered sail and cast anchor under the old fort, they fired six cannon over our mast, and the English officer comes aboard, and three of his aids, and the ship and cargo and all her writings was examined, and findin’ all right side up, he gin us permission to come ashore and do business; and the governor bought our load of provisions for the navy sarvice, and we got an extra price ‘case ’twas scarce; and while we lay there, there was four English gun-ships of the line come in freighted with soldiers from Plymouth, in England, and they was under the convoy of Admiral Emmons; and they left their soldiers and took some on the rock, and when they come in sight, if there warn’t some music and some smoke. All the instruments used in the English navy was played on the ships, and they fired gun arter gun, from the ships to the fort, and the fort to the ships, and every round they fired, they beat the English revelie, and oh! how them cannon shook the ship under us, and the smoke was so thick, you could fairly cut it; and so they kept it up, and I tell ye they had jolly times enough.