the details of any of these short voyages, but, instead, will give you one of them in the form of a ditty:
A Sailor’s Ditty.
’Twas on the twenty-first of April, from Hampton Roads we sailed,
Kind heaven did protect us with a sweet and pleasant gale.
’Twas on board the Roving Betsy, — bold Daniels was his name, —
And we were bound down to Laugarra on the Spanish Main.
When to Laugarra we came, my boys, our orders they were so:
To land a part of our cargo and proceed to Curacoa.
When to Curacoa we came, my boys, our cargo for to unload,
’Twas "Get the Betsy in readiness for Port Laugarra Roads."
Our captain called all hands aft, and then to us did say,
"Here’s money for you all, my lads, for to-morrow we go to sea."
’Twas early the next morning all hands appeared on board,
And cheerfully got under way for Port Laugarra Roads.
’Twas early the next morning, just at the break of day,
When a man at our foretop-mast-head a sail he did espy.
All hands being called to quarters, our courage for to try, —
All hands being called to quarters, — our enemy draws nigh.
She mounted twelve six-pounders, and fought one hundred men.
And now the action’s just begun — it was just half-past ten.
We mounted four six-pounders, and our crew was twenty-two;
But in fifty minutes by the watch we whipped those Spaniards blue.
And now we repaired, brave boys, bound for Columbia’s shore,
And for the famous America and the city of Baltimore.
Now, to conclude my ditty (these lines this world may view),
Success attend brave Daniels and his jovial twenty-two.
Home again! "Home, home, sweet home, — be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home." Never were there truer words written. So far I have not found anything homelike, or any sunshine, in the dark, damp, dingy, dreary forecastle. It does seem sort of jolly, though, when you pass round the can, and some old
