I knew
that it was all over after that, so I sprang over his carcass, and
gained the door. 'Good morning to ye all, and better manners to you next
time we meet,' cried I, and off I set as fast as I could for the ship.
"I was melancholy enough as I walked back, and thought of what had
passed. 'I need not have been in such a confounded hurry,' said I to
myself, 'to ask leave, thereby affronting the first lieutenant;' and I
was very sorry for what I had said to the priest, for my conscience
thumped me very hard at having even pretended that I'd turn Protestant,
which I never intended to do, nor never will, but live and die a good
Catholic, as all my posterity have done before me, and, as I trust, all
my ancestors will for generations to come. Well, I arrived on board, and
the first lieutenant was very savage. I hoped he would get over it, but
he never did; and he continued to treat me so ill that I determined to
quit the ship, which I did as soon as we arrived in Cawsand Bay. The
captain allowed me to go, for I told him the whole truth of the matter,
and he saw that it was true; so he recommended me to the captain of a
jackass frigate, who was in want of midshipmen."
"What do you mean by a jackass frigate?" inquired I.
"I mean one of your twenty-eight gun-ships, so called, because there is
as much difference between them and a real frigate, like the one we are
sailing in, as there is between a donkey and a racehorse. Well, the ship
was no sooner brought down to the dock-yard to have her ballast taken
in, than our captain came down to her--a little, thin, spare man, but a
man of weight nevertheless, for he brought a great pair of scales with
him, and weighed everything that was put on board.
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