Here is another paper; look over it, and see if it will suit you." I opened the paper; it was a true statement of my claim against the government for wages.

In the course of the day, the ship's company proceeded in a body to the office of the government agent, swore to our several accounts, and received our money.
The amount which fell to my share was not large.

I purchased some clothes, paid a few trifling debts that I had contracted while subjected to the "law's delay," which Shakespeare, a keen observer of men and manners, classes among the most grievous of human ills, and had a few dollars left.
After my experience of a sailor's life, after the treatment I had received, the miserable fare on which I had barely existed during a portion of the time, and the disgusting specimen of nautical morality I had met with in Captain Turner, it will not be considered surprising if my views of a sailor's life had been a little changed during my last voyage.

I entertained some doubts whether "going to sea," instead of being all poetry and romance, was not rather a PROSY affair, after all; and I more than once asked myself if a young man, of correct deportment and industrious habits, who could find some good and respectable business on shore, would not be a consummate fool to "go to sea." I deliberated anxiously on the subject, and finally determined to return to my home in New Hampshire, and visit my friends before I undertook another voyage.
The schooner Lydia, of Barnstable, commanded by Captain Burgess, an honest, noble-hearted son of Cape Cod, was the only vessel in Savannah at that time bound for Boston.

I explained to him my situation, told him I was anxious to get home, and asked as a favor that he would allow me to work my passage to Boston.
He replied that he had a full crew for his vessel, even more hands than could be properly accommodated below, as the cabin and steerage were both encumbered with bales of cotton.