rued _kind_-ly) by my father, my
mother, and your humble servant. My father had the sole charge--he was
monarch of the deck: my mother, of course, was queen, and I was the
heir-apparent.

Before I say one word about myself, allow me dutifully to describe my
parents. First, then, I will portray my queen mother. Report says,
that when she first came on board of the lighter, a lighter figure and a
lighter step never pressed a plank; but as far as I can tax my
recollection, she was always a fat, unwieldy woman. Locomotion was not
to her taste--gin was. She seldom quitted the cabin--never quitted the
lighter: a pair of shoes may have lasted her for five years for the wear
and tear she took out of them. Being of this domestic habit, as all
married women ought to be, she was always to be found when wanted; but
although always at hand, she was not always on her feet. Towards the
close of the day, she lay down upon her bed--a wise precaution when a
person can no longer stand. The fact was, that my honoured mother,
although her virtue was unimpeachable, was frequently seduced by liquor;
and although constant to my father, was debauched and to be found in bed
with that insidious assailer of female uprightness--_gin_. The lighter,
which might have been compared to another garden of Eden, of which my
mother was the Eve, and my father the Adam to consort with, was entered
by this serpent who tempted her; and if she did not eat, she drank,
which was even worse. At first, indeed--and I may mention it to prove
how the enemy always gains admittance under a specious form--she drank
it only to keep the cold out of her stomach, which the humid atmosphere
from the surrounding water appeared to warrant. My father took his pipe
for the same reason; but, at the time that I was born, he smoked and she
drank from morning to night, because habit had rendered it almost
necessary to their existence. The pipe was always to his lip, the glass
incessantly to hers. I would have defied any cold ever to have
penetrated into their stomachs;--but I have said enough of my mother for
the present; I will now pass on to my father.

My father was a puffy, round-bellied, long-armed, little man, admirably
calculated for his station in, or rather out of, society. He could
manage a lighter as well as anybody; but he could do no more. He had
been brought up to it from his infancy. He went on shore for my mother,
and came on board again--the only rema