ulk lies poor Torn Bowling!_" "_Cease,
rude Boreas, blustering railer!_" who, when ashore, at an eating-house,
call for a bowl of tar and a biscuit. These are the fellows who spin
interminable yarns about Decatur, Hull, and Bainbridge; and carry about
their persons bits of "Old Ironsides," as Catholics do the wood of the
true cross. These are the fellows that some officers never pretend to
damn, however much they may anathematize others. These are the fellows
that it does your soul good to look at;---hearty old members of the Old
Guard; grim sea grenadiers, who, in tempest time, have lost many a
tarpaulin overboard. These are the fellows whose society some of the
youngster midshipmen much affect; from whom they learn their best
seamanship; and to whom they look up as veterans; if so be, that they
have any reverence in their souls, which is not the case with all
midshipmen.

Then, there is the _After-guard_, stationed on the Quarterdeck; who,
under the Quarter-Masters and Quarter-Gunners, attend to the main-sail
and spanker, and help haul the main-brace, and other ropes in the stern
of the vessel.

The duties assigned to the After-Guard's-Men being comparatively light
and easy, and but little seamanship being expected from them, they are
composed chiefly of landsmen; the least robust, least hardy, and least
sailor-like of the crew; and being stationed on the Quarter-deck, they
are generally selected with some eye to their personal appearance.
Hence, they are mostly slender young fellows, of a genteel figure and
gentlemanly address; not weighing much on a rope, but weighing
considerably in the estimation of all foreign ladies who may chance to
visit the ship. They lounge away the most part of their time, in
reading novels and romances; talking over their lover affairs ashore;
and comparing notes concerning the melancholy and sentimental career
which drove them--poor young gentlemen--into the hard-hearted navy.
Indeed, many of them show tokens of having moved in very respectable
society. They always maintain a tidy exterior; and express an
abhorrence of the tar-bucket, into which they are seldom or never
called to dip their digits. And pluming themselves upon the cut of
their trowsers, and the glossiness of their tarpaulins, from the rest
of the ship's company, they acquire the name of "_sea-dandies_" and
"_silk-sock-gentry_."

Then, there are the _Waisters_, always stationed on the gun-deck. These
haul aft the fore an