cting as clerk took charge of the goods
and dealt them out to the others by fathoming them off with his arms,
this being their custom of measuring cloth. The goods being mostly
staple articles, the prices there seldom varied. Shell had a fixed price
of one dollar per pound. The captain paid little attention to the trade.
A small pump was left in a hogshead of rum, from which the clerk filled
the bottle and passed it round as often as it was called for, and every
few hours he would call the captain and give him a handful of money,
saying, "Here is so much," which he would put in his pocket, neither of
them counting it, nor would the captain ask anything about the trade.
Often the captain and myself took a canoe and went off fishing, leaving
fifty or sixty Indians on board dealing with the clerk, who had the sole
control of the trade. When we had finished trading at one place the
Indians piloted us to another harbor on the coast, where we proceeded in
the same manner. We sailed along the coast more than one hundred miles,
touching and trading at the different towns. Two of the natives took
passage with us for Jamaica, where we arrived about the first of
December. Here I tasted bread for the first time in eight months, having
lived on Indian bread-stuffs during that time, and seldom thinking of
any other, being well satisfied with that food. On our arrival at
Montego Bay the captain took me home to his house, and treated me very
politely.

Soon after my arrival in Jamaica I found a brig bound to Baltimore, and
took passage in her; I arrived there after a voyage of twenty-five days,
and sailed for New-York, where I had an interview with my owners, and
obtained a furlough from them for a few days, that I might visit my
family; after which I returned to New-York and proceeded back to the
Musquitto Shore.

CHAPTER XI.

Sloop Governor Tompkins.

In February, 1817, I took charge of the Sloop Governor Tompkins, of
thirty-four tons, belonging to the same owners that the Biddle did;
being promoted two tons in the size of the vessel. I took on board an
assorted cargo, bound for Old Providence, Corn Island, and Musquitto
Shore. I took with me a young man named Samuel B. Warner, to serve as
clerk of our store at Pearl Key Lagoon, where I intended to resume the
trade I had left. My crew consisted of a mate, two seamen, and a cook.
In the Gulf-stream we encountered a violent gale of wind, shipped a
heavy sea, which swept ou