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A sailor's interaction with a Marine recruit.
We then returned to our anchors [the narrator's ship was stationed in Cork at this point] and. about a month after, took under convoy 7 sail of homeward bound East India Men, and a Transport called the Paddy and Jenny, with recruits on board for the third or Plymouth division of marines; but being in want of seamen, I and five more were sent to assist the Captain in working her to Plymouth. when we got into a rough sea, the poor unseasoned recruits appeared like so many spectres; and when we came off the lizard, we carried away our fore top-mast; but getting up a jury top-mast, top-sail yard, &c. and standing off shore (the wind being a-head) a recruit came forward, saying, Arah, where are we going? I told him to Plymouth. But, how, my dear joy, said he, can leaving the land be going to Plymouth? I said we should shortly put about and stand the other way, which joyful tidings he instantly communicated to his comrades, who all wished to be on land again, that they might have a little respite from the rough treatment they had already met with on the watery element.
From Memoirs of a Seaman's Life: The Narrative of William Spavens, pp55-56, by the Folio Society, in 2000.
We then returned to our anchors [the narrator's ship was stationed in Cork at this point] and. about a month after, took under convoy 7 sail of homeward bound East India Men, and a Transport called the Paddy and Jenny, with recruits on board for the third or Plymouth division of marines; but being in want of seamen, I and five more were sent to assist the Captain in working her to Plymouth. when we got into a rough sea, the poor unseasoned recruits appeared like so many spectres; and when we came off the lizard, we carried away our fore top-mast; but getting up a jury top-mast, top-sail yard, &c. and standing off shore (the wind being a-head) a recruit came forward, saying, Arah, where are we going? I told him to Plymouth. But, how, my dear joy, said he, can leaving the land be going to Plymouth? I said we should shortly put about and stand the other way, which joyful tidings he instantly communicated to his comrades, who all wished to be on land again, that they might have a little respite from the rough treatment they had already met with on the watery element.
From Memoirs of a Seaman's Life: The Narrative of William Spavens, pp55-56, by the Folio Society, in 2000.
