Ben Burton: Born and Bred at Sea

"Dick Burton, you're a daddy! Polly's been and got a baby for you, old boy!" exclaimed several voices, as the said Dick mounted the side of the old "Boreas," on the books of which ship he was rated as a quarter-master, he having just then returned from a pleasant little cutting-out expedition, where he had obtained, besides honour and glory, a gash on the cheek, a bullet through the shoulder, and a prong from a pike in the side.

"Me a what?" he inquired, bending his head forward with a look of incredulity, and mechanically hitching up his trousers. "Me a daddy? On course it's a boy? Polly wouldn't go for to get a girl, a poor little helpless girl, out in these outlandish parts."

"On course, Dick, it's a boy, a fine big, walloping younker, too. Why bless ye, Quacko ain't no way to be compared to him, especially when he sings out, which he can do already, loud enough to drown the bo'sun's whistle, let me tell you," was the reply to Dick Burton's last question.

That baby was me. Quacko was the monkey of the ship. I might not have been flattered at being compared to him, though it must be owned that I stood very much in the light of his rival. I soon, however, cut him out completely. My mother was one of two women on board. The other was Susan King, wife of another quarter-master. The two men enjoyed a privilege denied to their captain, for they could take their wives to sea, which he could not. To be sure, Polly and Susan made themselves more generally useful than the captain's wife would probably have done had she lived on board, for they washed and mended the men's shirts, nursed them when sick or wounded, prepared lint and bandages for the surgeons, and performed many other offices such as generally fall to the lot of female hands. They had both endeared themselves to the men, by a thousand kind and gentle acts, but my mother was decidedly the favourite. This might have been because she was young and remarkably handsome, and at the same time as good and modest as a woman could be; and so discreet that she was never known to cause a quarrel among her shipmates, or a pang of jealousy to her husband; and that, under the circumstances of the case, is saying a great deal in her favour. Fancy two women among nearly four hundred men, and not one of the latter even thinking of infringing the last commandment of the Decalogue. What an amount of good sense, good-temper, and self-command must have been exercised on the part of the former.

Susan's qualifications for the position she held were very different to those of my mother. In appearance she was a very Gorgon, a veritable strong-minded, double-fisted female, tall, gaunt, and coarse-featured. A hoarse laugh, and a voice which vied with the boatswain's in stentorian powers, and yet withal she was a true woman, with a gentle, loving, tender heart. Bill King, her husband, knew her good qualities, and vowed that he would not swap her for Queen Charlotte, or any other lady in the land, not if the offer was made to him with a thousand gold guineas into the bargain.

I ought to be grateful to her, and do cherish her memory with affection, for she assisted to bring me into the world; attended my mother in her time of trial and trouble, and nursed me with the gentlest care. Yet Sue had a tongue, and could use it too when occasion, in her judgment, required its employment. But she always took the side of right and virtue against wrong and vice, and woe betided the luckless wight who fell under the ban of her just displeasure. She would belabour him, not with her hands, but by word, look, and gesture, till he shrieked out for mercy and promised never again to offend, or took to ignominious flight like a thief with a posse of constables at his heels. Bill King was a quiet-mannered little man with a huge pair of whiskers, like studden-sails rigged out on either side of his cheeks, and a mild expression of countenance which did not belie his calm good-temper and amiability of disposition. But though gentle in peace, he was as brave and daring a seaman as ever sprang, cutlass in hand, on an enemy's deck, or flew aloft to loose topsails when a prize had been cut out, amid showers of bullets and round-shot.

Of my father, I will only say that he was in no way behind his friend Bill King in bravery, and though he spoke the sailor's lingo like his shipmates, he was vastly his superior in manners and appearance. Indeed, he and my mother were a very handsome couple. They were also, I may say, deservedly looked upon with great respect by the officers, from the captain downwards, and regarded with affection by all the crew.

To go back to that insignificant little individual, myself, as I certainly was on the day I have mentioned, when I made my first appearance on board the HMS "Boreas". I came in for a large share of the regard entertained by the ship's company for my parents. My father was the first person introduced by Susan King into my presence.

"Well, he is a rum little youngster!" he exclaimed, taking me up in his open palms. "He is like Polly--that he is!" he added, as he gazed at me affectionately, the feelings of a father for the first time welling up in his bosom. "Yes, he is a sweet little cherub! Shouldn't wonder but he is like them as lives up aloft there to watch over us poor chaps at sea. Ay, that he must be. They can't beat him. Lord love ye, Sue, I am grateful to you for this here day's work."

I here interrupted my father's remarks by a loud cry, and other infantine operations, on which Sue insisted on having me back again to her safe keeping, while outside the screen several voices were heard entreating my father to bring me out for inspection, a request with which Mrs King had before steadily refused to comply.

"I say, Dick, just let's have a look at him. One squint, Burton, just to see what sort of a younker he may be. Come now, he ain't a chap to be ashamed of, I'm sure. There ain't none like him here aboard, I'll swear. He don't come up to Quacko anyhow. Come, Dick, show us him now, do, there's a good chap."

These and similar exclamations were sung out by various voices in different tones, to which my mother, as she lay in her cot, listened not unpleased, till at length my father having given her a kiss, and uttered a few words of congratulation and thanks to Heaven--sailors are not addicted to long prayers--again took me in his outstretched palms, and thus brought me forth to the admiring gaze of his shipmates. So eager were they to see me, that I ran no little risk of being knocked out of my father's hands, as they were shoving each other aside in their endeavours to get to the front rank. Then one and all wanted to have me to handle for a moment; but to this Susan King, who had followed my father from behind the screen, would on no account consent.

"Why, bless you, my lads, you would be wringing the little chap's neck off, if you were to attempt to take hold of him," said Susan.

"Oh! No, don't fear, we will handle him just as if he was made of sugar," was the reply.

"Oh! You don't know what delicate, weak little creatures these babies are when they are first born," observed Susan. "Just like jellyfish, they will not stand any rough handling."

Still in spite of my kind nurse's remarks, the bystanders continued to urge my father to let them have me.

"It is as much as my place is worth, mates," he answered at length; "I would not let him out of my hands on no account."

My new shipmates were, therefore, compelled to admire me at a respectful distance. I believe the remarks they made were generally complimentary, only they seemed to have arrived at the opinion that I was not at that time so fat or so fair as the cherubs they had heard of who live up aloft.

"And now, mates, I will just hand him back to Susan, and go and get the doctor to look at me, for I begin to feel pretty stiffish with the holes I got made in me just now," said my father.

And I was forthwith reconsigned to the charge of my mother and her attendant, while he went to the surgeon to get his wounds dressed. There were none of them, fortunately very serious, for the bullet had gone through the fleshy part of the arm, and the pike had missed the bone; the cut in the cheek, which at first appeared the most trifling, giving in the end more trouble and annoyance than either of the other hurts. The expedition in which he had been engaged was something out of the common way, though when I come to note down the numerous ones he has described to me, it is somewhat difficult not to mix them all up together.

The frigate, on board which I thus suddenly found myself, formed one of the East India Squadron, of which Admiral Peter Rainier was Commander-in-Chief.

The "Boreas" had a short time before this been despatched to Macao for the protection of the China trade. I speak of course from hearsay, as what I am about to relate occurred just before I came into existence; indeed, of many other subsequent events which I shall venture to describe I cannot be said to have any very vivid recollection, although present at the time. The frigate was standing to the eastward, some three or four leagues from the coast, when one of the topmen, Pat Brady, on the look-out at the mast-head, discovered a sail in shore to the northward. Pat was a relation of my mother--she was an Irishwoman, and, as Pat never failed to assert, a credit to her country. He would at all times have been ready to fight any man who ventured to hold a different opinion.