ese words been spoken, when I heard a splash in the
water, followed by a faint cry of distress and despair. In the next
instant the brig was hove about, and the stern-boat lowered down,
accompanied by all the hurried symptoms of a man having fallen
overboard. I made the people in the boat tug at their oars towards the
spot; but though we pulled over and over the ship's wake twenty times,
the water was everywhere unruffled and unmarked by any speck. At
length I rowed on board, turned the hands up to muster, to ascertain
who was gone, and found all present but our poor little Triton! It
appeared that the lad, who was one of the sides-men, fatigued with the
day's amusement, had stretched himself in the fore-part of the
quarter-deck hammock-netting, and gone to sleep. The sharp voice of
the officer, on seeing the gig almost alongside, had roused the
unhappy boy too suddenly; he quite forgot where he was, and, instead
of jumping in-board, plunged into the sea, never to rise again!

There are few accidents more frequent at sea than that of a man
falling overboard; and yet, strange to say, whenever it happens, it
takes every one as completely by surprise as if such a thing had never
occurred before. What is still more unaccountable, and, I must say,
altogether inexcusable, is the fact of such an incident invariably
exciting a certain degree of confusion, even in well-regulated ships.
Whenever I have witnessed the tumultuous rush of the people from
below, their eagerness to crowd into the boats, and the reckless
devotion with which they fling themselves into the water to save their
companions, I could not help thinking that it was no small disgrace to
us, to whose hands the whole arrangements of discipline are confided,
that we had not yet fallen upon any method of availing ourselves to
good purpose of so much generous activity.

Sailors are men of rough habits, but their feelings are not by any
means coarse; and, generally speaking, they are much attached to one
another, and will make great sacrifices to their messmates or
shipmates when opportunities occur. A very little address on the part
of the officers, as I have before hinted, will secure an extension of
these kindly sentiments to the quarter-deck. But what I was alluding
to just now was the cordiality of the friendships which spring up
between the sailors themselves, who, it must be recollected, have no
other society, and all, or almost all, whose ordinary social ties