I made him acquainted with my story, and, when he heard how inhumanly I had been used in the tender, he left me abruptly, assuring me I should see him again soon.

I had scarce time to wonder at his sudden departure, when the master-at-arms came to the place of my confinement, and bade me follow him to the quarter-deck, where I was examined by the first lieutenant, who commanded the ship in the absence of the captain, touching the treatment I had received in the tender from my friend the midshipman, who was present to confront me.
I recounted the particulars of his behaviour to me, not only in the tender, but since my being on board the ship, part of which being proved by the evidence of Jack Rattlin and others, who had no great devotion for my oppressor, I was discharged from confinement, to make way for him, who was delivered to the master-at-arms to take his turn in the bilboes.

And this was not the only satisfaction I enjoyed, for I was, at the request of the surgeon, exempted from all other duty than that of assisting his mates, in making and administering medicines to the sick.
This good office I owed to the friendship of Mr.Thompson, who had represented me in such a favourable light to the surgeon, that he demanded me of the lieutenant to supply the place of his third mate, who was lately dead.

When I had obtained this favour, my friend Thompson carried me down to the cockpit, which is the place allotted for the habitation of the surgeon's mates; and when he had shown me their berth (as he called it), I was filled with astonishment and horror, We descended by divers ladders to a space as dark as a dungeon, which, I understood, was immersed several feet under water, being immediately above the hold.

I had no sooner approached this dismal gulph, than my nose was saluted with an intolerable stench of putrified cheese and rancid butter, that issued from an apartment at the foot of the ladder, resembling a chandler's shop, where, by the faint glimmering of a candle, I could perceive a man with a pale, meagre countenance, sitting behind a kind of desk, having spectacles on his nose, and a pen in his hand.