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SHIP PACKET OF BOSTON.
Having been two voyages to the West Indies and one to the Brazils, I began to regard myself as a sailor of no little experience.

When rigged out in my blue jacket and trousers, with a neatly covered straw hat, a black silk kerchief tied jauntily around my neck, I felt confidence in my own powers and resources, and was ready, and, as I thought, able to grapple with any thing in the shape of good or ill fortune that might come along.

I was aware that success in life depended on my own energies, and I looked forward to a brilliant career in the arduous calling which I had embraced.

Like Ancient Pistol, I could say, "The world's mine oyster, Which I with sword will open!" With this difference, that I proposed to substitute, for the present at least, a marlinspike for the sword.
Captain Page invited me to remain by the Clarissa and accompany him on a voyage to Gibraltar, but I felt desirous of trying my fortune and gain knowledge of my calling in a good ship bound to the East Indies, or on a fur-trading voyage to the "north-west coast" of America.
At that time the trade with the Indians for furs on the "north-west coast" was carried on extensively from Boston.