and
Dame Nature, who I believe to be a very clever midwife if not interfered
with. My father, who had some faint ideas of Christianity, performed
the baptismal rites by crossing me on the forehead with the end of his
pipe, and calling me Jacob: as for my mother being churched, she had
never been but once to church in her life. In fact, my father and
mother never quitted the lighter, unless when the former was called out
by the superintendent or proprietor, at the delivery or shipment of a
cargo, or was once a month for a few minutes on shore to purchase
necessaries. I cannot recall much of my infancy; but I recollect that
the lighter was often very brilliant with blue and red paint, and that
my mother used to point it out to me as "so pretty," to keep me quiet.
I shall therefore pass it over, and commence at the age of five years,
at which early period I was of some little use to my father. Indeed I
was almost as forward as some boys at ten. This may appear strange; but
the fact is, that my ideas although bounded, were concentrated. The
lighter, its equipments, and its destination were the microcosm of my
infant imagination; and my ideas and thoughts being directed to so few
objects, these objects were deeply impressed, and their value fully
understood. Up to the time that I quitted the lighter, at eleven years
old, the banks of the river were the boundaries of my speculations. I
certainly comprehended something of the nature of trees and houses; but
I do not think that I was aware that the former _grew_. From the time
that I could recollect them on the banks of the river, they appeared to
be exactly of the same size as they were when first I saw them, and I
asked no questions. But by the time that I was ten years old, I knew
the name of the reach of the river, and every point--the depth of water,
and the shallows, the drift of the current, and the ebb and flow of the
tide itself. I was able to manage the lighter as it floated down with
the tide; for what I lacked in strength I made up with dexterity arising
from constant practice.

It was at the age of eleven years that a catastrophe took place which
changed my prospects in life, and I must, therefore, say a little more
about my father and mother, bringing up their history to that period.
The propensity of my mother to ardent spirits had, as always is the
case, greatly increased upon her, and her corpulence had increased in
the same ratio. She was now a mos