My First Voyage to Southern Seas

Ours was a very united and a very happy family. We lived in the neighbourhood of London, near Blackheath, in Kent, on the elevated ground which overlooks Greenwich, its noble hospital, and the river Thames. Our father was a merchant, a thoroughly upright, industrious man, an honour to the profession to which he belonged. No man could be more attentive to business than he was, and yet no one enjoyed the country and the pursuits of the country more than he did. With what pleasure did we look forward, when we were children, to his return in the afternoon and even now I think I hear his cheerful laugh, and see his bland smile, as he took us up one by one in his arms and kissed us, and then often, though he must frequently have been tired and harassed, had a game of boisterous romps with us, seeming entirely to have forgotten all his cares and troubles. It was considered the privilege of little Kate, or one of the other young ones, to look slily into his pockets when, by a well-known significant gesture, he let us understand that they were not altogether empty. He had a little hand hamper or basket, such as many another paterfamilias possesses, which travelled with great regularity up and down nearly every day, and out of which all sorts of wonderful articles used to appear; and if a friend accompanied him unexpectedly down to dinner, our mother never had to complain that she was taken unawares and had nothing fit to offer him. The hamper, however, did not always contain eatables. Often our mother, or one of us, had been wishing very much for something which could not possibly have got into his pockets, and before many days were over, it was very nearly certain to make its appearance, when the top of the hamper was thrown back, imbedded in straw or paper. That dear old hamper always put us in mind of some magic chest in a fairy tale, only I doubt if any magic chest ever afforded so much pleasure, or produced so great a variety of articles as it did. I do not know if our kind father ever was out of humour; if he was, he left the appearance of it behind him in the city. Out of spirits he seldom or never was in my childhood's days.

The time was coming when a sad change was to occur. I mention these traits, trivial though they may seem, because I think that they speak well of my father's character. At the same time that he was a most affectionate father, he never forgot the necessity of correcting us for our faults; while he was deeply sensible of the importance of fitting us for the stations in life we might be destined to occupy, and of placing clearly before us the object of our existence on earth, and our duty to God and to our fellow-men. He watched over us with the most anxious solicitude during every moment he could spare; he took us out to walk with him, and had us constantly in his room, never wearying, apparently, of our society. This he did, I have no doubt, not only because he loved us, but that he might ascertain our different characters and dispositions, and at once eradicate, as far as he was able, each budding tendency to evil as it appeared.

Such was my father, a fine, intelligent, gentlemanly, handsome man; and though his hair was perfectly grey, his complexion was yet clear, nor had his eye lost the animation of youth. It is with great satisfaction that I can look back and picture him as I have now faithfully drawn his portrait.

Our dear mother, too, she was worthy to be his wife,--so amiable, and loving, and sensible, a pious Christian and a perfect gentlewoman, thoroughly educated, and capable of bringing up her daughters to fill the same station in life she occupied, which was all she desired for them. Indeed, we boys also received much of our early instruction from her, and I feel very certain that we retained far more of what she taught us than we acquired from any other source. To her we owed, especially, lessons of piety and instruction in the Holy Scriptures, never, I trust, to be forgotten, as well as much elementary secular knowledge, which probably we should otherwise have been very long in picking up. My mother had no relations of whom we, at all events, knew anything in England. She was the daughter of an Englishman, however, who had, when the Mauritius first came under the dominion of Great Britain, gone out there as a settler and planter, leaving her, his only child, to be educated in England.

Mr Coventry, my grandfather, was, we understood, of a somewhat eccentric disposition, and had for some years wandered about in the Eastern seas and among the islands of the Pacific, although he had ultimately returned again to his estate. He had transmitted home ample funds for his daughter's education, but he kept up very little communication with her, and had never even expressed any intention of sending for her to join him. The lady under whose charge she had been left was a very excellent person, and had thoroughly done her duty by her in cultivating to the utmost all the good qualities and talents she possessed. That lady was a friend of my father's family, and thus my father became acquainted with her pupil, to whom he was before long married.

It was necessary for me to give this brief account of my family history, to explain the causes which produced some of my subsequent adventures.

We were a large family. I had several brothers and sisters. I was the third son, and I had two elder sisters. Alfred, my eldest brother, was a fine joyous-spirited fellow. Some said he was too spirited, and unwilling to submit to discipline. He was just cut out for a sailor,-- so everybody said, and so he thought himself, and to sea he had resolved to go. Our father exerted all the interest he possessed to get him into the navy, and succeeded. We thought it a very fine thing for him when we heard that he really and truly was going to be a midshipman. It appeared to us as if there was but one step between that and being an admiral, or, at all events, a post-captain in command of a fine line-of-battle ship. Neither our mother nor sisters had at first at all wished that Alfred should go to sea; indeed, our father would, I believe, have much rather seen him enter into the business of a merchant; but as soon as the matter was settled, they all set to work with the utmost zeal and energy to get his kit ready for sea. Many a sigh I heard, and many a tear I saw dropped over the shirts, and stockings, and pocket-handkerchiefs, as they were being marked, when he was not near. Too often had they read of dreadful shipwrecks, of pestiferous climates, of malignant fevers carrying off the young as well as the old, the strong as well as the weak, not to feel anxious about Alfred, and to dread that he might be among those gallant spirits who go away out-flowing with health, and hope, and confidence, and yet are destined never again to visit their native land, or to see the faces of those who love them so much. Alfred was full of life and animation, and very active in assisting in the preparations making for his departure. Well do I remember the evening when his uniform came down. With what hurried fingers we undid the parcel, and how eagerly I rushed up-stairs with him to help him to put it on! What a fine fellow I thought he looked; how proud I felt of him, as I walked round and round him, admiring the gold lace and the white patches worn by midshipmen in those days, and the dirk by his side, and the glossy belt, and the crown and anchor on his buttons and in his cap, and more than all, when I felt that he was really and truly an officer in the navy! Still more delighted was I when I accompanied him down-stairs, and heard the commendations of all the family on his appearance. Our father, with a hand on his shoulder, could not help exclaiming, "Well, Alfred, you are a jolly midshipman, my boy." And then all the servants had collected in the hall to have a look at him, and they were none of them chary of their expressions of admiration.

It was some days after this before all the multifarious contents of the chest were ready, and then came the parting day. That was a very sad one to our mother and elder sisters. I did not fully realise the fact that we were to be parted till he had actually gone, so my sorrow did not begin till I found his place empty, and had to go about by myself without his genial companionship. Our father took him down to Portsmouth, where he was to join his ship, the Aurora frigate, destined for the East India station, and our second brother Herbert accompanied him. Herbert was delicate, and required a change of scene and air. I longed to have gone too, but our father could not take both of us. My great desire was to see a large ship, a real man-of-war. I knew very well what a vessel was like, for I had seen numbers in the Thames, and one of Alfred's great pleasures was to take me with him to Greenwich Hospital, and to sit down on the benches and to watch the vessels sailing up and down the river, while we talked with the old pensioners, who were always ready to spin some of their longest yarns for our edification, though older people who went down there for the purpose found no little difficulty in getting anything out of them. This was not surprising. The old sailors found in us attentive and undoubting listeners. We never thought of even questioning them to let them suspect that we had not the most perfect reliance on what they said, which older people were apt to do, I observed, for the purpose of gaining more information from them. The old tars were either offended, from suspecting that their words were doubted, or fancied that their interrogators had some sinister motives in putting such questions, and, from an early habit of suspicion in all such instances, would shut up their mouths, and seem to have forgotten all about their early lives.

In the way I have mentioned, both Alfred and I gained a great deal of information about the sea and life in the navy, so that when he went afloat he was not nearly as ignorant as are many youngsters. In one respect, however, he had gained, unfortunately, no good from his intercourse with the old sailors. He had deeply imbibed many of the worst prejudices about the navy which even some old men-of-war's men retain to the present day, and he was taught to look upon all superior officers in the service as cruel and unjust tyrants, whom it was spirited to disobey when practicable, and ingenious to circumvent in every possible way. His feeling, in short, was very much that which schoolboys have for the ordinary run of masters whom they do not exactly detest for any unusual severity, but for whom they certainly do not entertain any undue affection. When he first received his appointment, he had forgotten all about this feeling; indeed, he had never expressed himself strongly on the matter; only I know that it existed. I mention it now as it accounted to me in some degree for his subsequent conduct.

When our father came back he gave a vivid description of the smart frigate in which dear Alfred was to sail, of the gentlemanly, pleasant captain, and of the nice lads in the midshipmen's berth who were to be his companions. The first lieutenant, he remarked, was a stern-looking, weather-beaten sailor of the old school, but he had the repute of being a first-rate officer, and the captain had told him that he was very glad to get him, as he was sure to make all the youngsters learn and do their duty, and to turn them into good seamen. Altogether, he was perfectly satisfied with all he had seen, and with Alfred's prospects.