ander off your sonnets, when
the full heart prompts; but only, when more important duties permit:
such as bracing round the yards, or reefing top-sails fore and aft.
Nevertheless, every fragment of time at his command was religiously
devoted by Lemsford to the Nine. At the most unseasonable hours, you
would behold him, seated apart, in some corner among the guns--a
shot-box before him, pen in hand, and eyes "_in a fine frenzy rolling_."

"What's that 'ere born nat'ral about?"--"He's got a fit, hain't he?"
were exclamations often made by the less learned of his shipmates. Some
deemed him a conjurer; others a lunatic; and the knowing ones said,
that he must be a crazy Methodist. But well knowing by experience the
truth of the saying, that _poetry is its own exceeding great reward_,
Lemsford wrote on; dashing off whole epics, sonnets, ballads, and
acrostics, with a facility which, under the circumstances, amazed me.
Often he read over his effusions to me; and well worth the hearing they
were. He had wit, imagination, feeling, and humour in abundance; and
out of the very ridicule with which some persons regarded him, he made
rare metrical sport, which we two together enjoyed by ourselves; or
shared with certain select friends.

Still, the taunts and jeers so often levelled at my friend the poet,
would now and then rouse him into rage; and at such times the haughty
scorn he would hurl on his foes, was proof positive of his possession
of that one attribute, irritability, almost universally ascribed to the
votaries of Parnassus and the Nine.

My noble captain, Jack Chase, rather patronised Lemsford, and he would
stoutly take his part against scores of adversaries. Frequently,
inviting him up aloft into his top, he would beg him to recite some of
his verses; to which he would pay the most heedful attention, like
Maecenas listening to Virgil, with a book of Aeneid in his hand. Taking
the liberty of a well-wisher, he would sometimes gently criticise the
piece, suggesting a few immaterial alterations. And upon my word, noble
Jack, with his native-born good sense, taste, and humanity, was not ill
qualified to play the true part of a _Quarterly Review_;--which is, to
give quarter at last, however severe the critique.

Now Lemsford's great care, anxiety, and endless source of tribulation
was the preservation of his manuscripts. He had a little box, about the
size of a small dressing-case, and secured with a lock, in which he
kept