Ned Myers, or, a Life Before the Mast Part 15

It was my old shipmate--the gentleman who has written out this account of my career, from my verbal narrative of the facts.

Mr. Cooper asked me to go up to his place, in the country, and pa.s.s a few weeks there. I cheerfully consented, and we reached Cooperstown early in June. Here I found a neat village, a beautiful lake, nine miles long, and, altogether, a beautiful country. I had never been as far from the sea before, the time when I served on Lake Ontario excepted. Cooperstown lies in a valley, but Mr. Cooper tells me it is at an elevation of twelve hundred feet above tide-water. To me, the clouds appeared so low, I thought I could almost shake hands with them; and, altogether, the air and country were different from any I had ever seen, or breathed, before.

My old shipmate took me often on the Lake, which I will say is a slippery place to navigate. I thought I had seen all sorts of winds before I saw the Otsego, but, on this lake it sometimes blew two or three different ways at the same time. While knocking about this piece of water, in a good stout boat, I related to my old shipmate many of the incidents of my wandering life, until, one day, he suggested it might prove interesting to publish them. I was willing, could the work be made useful to my brother sailors, and those who might be thrown into the way of temptations like those which came so near wrecking all my hopes, both for this world, and that which is to come. We accordingly went to work between us, and the result is now laid before the world. I wish it understood, that this is literally my own story, logged by my old shipmate.

It is now time to clew up. When a man has told all he has to say, the sooner he is silent the better. Every word that has been related, I believe to be true; when I am wrong, it proceeds from ignorance, or want of memory. I may possibly have made some trifling mistakes about dates, and periods, but I think they would turn out to be few, on inquiry. In many instances I have given my impressions, which, like those of other men, may be right, or may be wrong. As for the main facts, however, I know them to be true, nor do I think myself much out of the way, in any of the details.

This is the happiest period of my life, and has been so since I left the hospital at Batavia. I do not know that I have ever pa.s.sed a happier summer than the present has been. I should be perfectly satisfied with everything, did not my time hang so idle on my hands at the Harbour. I want something to occupy my leisure moments, and do not despair of yet being able to find a mode of life more suitable to the activity of my early days. I have friends enough--more than I deserve--and, yet, a man needs occupation, who has the strength and disposition to be employed.

That which is to happen is in the hands of Providence, and I humbly trust I shall be cared for, to the end, as I have been cared for, through so many scenes of danger and trial.

My great wish is that this picture of a sailor's risks and hardships, may have some effect in causing this large and useful cla.s.s of men to think on the subject of their habits. I entertain no doubt that the money I have disposed of far worse than if I had thrown it into the sea, which went to reduce me to that mental h.e.l.l, the 'horrors,' and which, on one occasion, at least, drove me to the verge of suicide, would have formed a sum, had it been properly laid by, on which I might now have been enjoying an old age of comfort and respectability. It is seldom that a seaman cannot lay by a hundred dollars in a twelvemonth--oftentimes I have earned double that amount, beyond my useful outlays--and a hundred dollars a year, at the end of thirty years, would give such a man an independence for the rest of his days. This is far from all, however; the possession of means would awaken the desire of advancement in the calling, and thousands, who now remain before the mast, would long since have been officers, could they have commanded the self-respect that property is apt to create.

On the subject of liquor, I can say nothing that has not often been said by others, in language far better than I can use. I do not think I was as bad, in this respect, as perhaps a majority of my a.s.sociates; yet, this narrative will show how often the habit of drinking to excess impeded my advance. It was fast converting me into a being inferior to a man, and, but for G.o.d's mercy, might have rendered me the perpetrator of crimes that it would shock me to think of, in my sober and sane moments.

The past, I have related as faithfully as I have been able so to do. The future is with G.o.d; to whom belongeth power, and glory, for ever and ever!

The End.

Footnotes

[1]: The writer left a blank for this regiment, and now inserts it from memory. It is probable he is wrong.

[2]: Edward, Duke of Kent, was born November 2, 1767, and made a peer April 23, 1799; when he was a little turned of one-and-thirty. It is probable that this creation took place on his return to England; after pa.s.sing some six or eight years in America and the West Indies. He served in the West Indies with great personal distinction, during his stay in this hemisphere.--Editor.

[3]: This is Ned's p.r.o.nunciation; though it is probable the name is not spelt correctly. The names of Ned are taken a good deal at random; and, doubtless, are often misspelled.--Editor.

[4]: I well remember using these arguments to Ned; though less with any expectations of being admitted, than the boy seemed to believe. There was more roguery, than anything else, in my persuasion; though it was mixed with a latent wish to see the interior of the palace.--Editor.

[5]: Second-mate.

[6]: 22d--Editor.

[7]: When Myers related this circ.u.mstance, I remembered that a Lieutenant-Colonel Meyers had been killed in the affair at Fort George, something in the way here mentioned. On consulting the American official account, I found that my recollection was just, so far as this--a Lieutenant-Colonel Meyers was reported as wounded and taken prisoner. I then recollected to have been present at a conversation between Major-General Lewis and Major Baker, his adjutant-general, shortly after the battle, in which the question arose whether the same shot had killed Colonel Meyers that killed his horse. General Lewis thought not; Major Baker thought it had. On my referring to the official account as reporting this gentleman to have been only _wounded_, I was told it was a mistake, he having been _killed_. Now for the probabilities. Both Ned and his sister understand that their father was slain in battle, about this time. Ned thought this occurred at Waterloo, but the sister thinks not. Neither knew anything of the object of my inquiry. The sister says letters were received from _Quebec_ in relation to the father's personal effects. It would be a strange thing, if Ned had actually found his own father's body on the field, in this extraordinary manner! I pretend not to say it is so; but it must be allowed it looks very much like it. The lady may have been a wife, married between the years 1796 and 1813, when Mr. Meyers had got higher rank. This occurrence was related by Ned without the slightest notion of the inference that I have here drawn.--Editor.

[8]: It is supposed that Capt. Deacon died, a few years since, in consequence of an injury he received on board the Growler, this night. A shot struck her main-boom, within a short distance of one of his ears, and he ever after complained of its effects. At his death this side of his head was much swollen and affected.--Editor.

[9]: By this, Ned means six men had to subsist on the usual allowance of four men; a distinction that was made between men on duty and men off.

Prisoners, too, are commonly allowed to help themselves in a variety of ways.--Editor.

[10]: The name of this young officer was King. He is now dead, having been lost in the Lynx, Lt. Madison.--Editor.

[11]: If this be true, this could hardly have been a court, but must have been a mere investigation; as Sir John Borlase Warren was commander-in-chief, and would scarcely sit in a court of his own ordering.--Editor.

[12]: Ned means Loto, probably.--Editor.

[13]: Ned might have added "few d.u.c.h.esses." The amba.s.sadors' bags in Europe, might ten many a tale of _foulards_, &c., sent from one court to another. The writer believes that the higher cla.s.s of American gentlemen and ladies smuggle less than those of any other country. It should be remembered, too, that no seaman goes in a smuggler, thut is not sent by traders ash.o.r.e.--Editor.

[14]: A friend, who was then American Consul at Gibraltar, and an old navy officer, tells me Ned is mistaken as to the nature of the anchorage. The ship was a little too far out for the best holding ground. The same friend adds that the character of this gale is not at all overcharged, the vessels actually lost, including small craft of every description, amounting to the every way extraordinary number of just three hundred and sixty-five.--Editor.

[15]: This is the reasoning of Ned. I have always looked upon the American law as erroneous in principle, and too severe in its penalties. Erroneous in principle, as piracy is a crime against the law of nations, and it is not legal for any one community to widen, or narrow, the action of international law. It is peculiarly the policy of this country, rigidly to observe this principle, since she has so many interests dependent on its existence. The punishment of death is too severe, when we consider that nabobs are among us, who laid the foundations of their wealth, as slaving _merchants_, when slaving _was_ legal. Sudden mutations in morals, are not to be made by a dash of the pen; and even public sentiment can hardly be made to consider slaving much of a crime, in a slave-holding community. But, even the punishment of death might be inflicted, without arrogating to Congress a power to say what is, and what is not, piracy.

It will probably be said, the error is merely one of language; the jurisdiction being clearly legal. Is this true? Can Congress, legally or const.i.tutionally, legislate for American citizens, when undeniably within the jurisdiction of foreign states? Admit this as a principle, and what is to prevent Congress from punishing acts, that it may be the policy of foreign countries to exact from even casual residents. If Congress can punish me, as a pirate, for slaving under a foreign flag, and in foreign countries, it can punish me for carrying arms against all American allies; and yet military service may be exacted of even an American citizen, resident in a foreign state, under particular circ.u.mstances. The same difficulty, in principle, may be extended to the whole catalogue of legal crime.

Congress exists only for specified purposes. It can _punish_ piracy, but it cannot declare what shall, or shall not, be piracy; as this would be invading the authority of international law. Under the general power to pa.s.s laws, that are necessary to carry out the system, it can derive no authority; since there can be no legal necessity for any such double legislation, under the comity of nations. Suppose, for instance, England should legalize slaving, again. Could the United States claim the American citizen, who had engaged in slaving, under the English flag, and from a British port, under the renowned Ashburton treaty? Would England give such a man up? No more than she will now give up the slaves that run from the American vessel, which is driven in by stress of weather. One of the vices of philanthropy is to overreach its own policy, by losing sight of all collateral principles and interests.--Editor.

[16]: Ned's p.r.o.nunciation.

[17]: I find, in looking over his papers and accounts, that Ned, exclusively of all the prison-ships, transports, and vessels in which he made pa.s.sages, has belonged regularly to seventy-two different crafts! In some of these vessels he made many voyages, In the Sterling, he made several pa.s.sages with the writer; besides four European voyages, at a later day. He made four voyages to Havre in the Erie, which counts as only one vessel, in the above list. He was three voyages to London, in the Washington, &c. &c. &c.; and often made two voyages in the same ship. I am of opinion that Ned's calculation of his having been twenty-five years out of sight of land is very probably true. He must have _sailed, in all ways_, in near a hundred different craft.--Editor.

[18]: p.r.o.nounced, Wheaton--Editor.