'May be you'll be so civil as to tell me what ship that is,' said I to a sailor on the pier.

'It's the Queen Charlotte,' replied he, 'of one hundred and twenty guns.' Now when I looked at her size, and compared her with all the little smacks and hoys lying about her, I very naturally asked how old she was; he replied, that she was no more than three years old.

'But three years old!' thought I to myself, 'it's a fine vessel you'll be when you'll come of age, if you grow at that rate: you'll be as tall as the top of Bencrow,'(that's a mountain we have in our parts).

You see, Peter, I was a fool at that time, just as you are now; but by-and-by, when you've had as many thrashings as I have had, you may chance to be as clever.

I went back to my father, and told him all I had seen, and he replied, that if I liked it I might be a midshipman on board of her, with nine hundred men under my command.