s steward. They each had
their peculiarities; but I will not stop now to describe them. We had
twenty men forward, all picked hands; for, with the long voyage we
contemplated, and the service we were on, it was necessary to be
strongly manned. I must not omit a description of the _Triton_ herself.
She had a raised poop, beneath which were situated the chief cabins,
and a forecastle, under which the crew lived in two compartments, one on
either side of it. There was also a caboose, or galley, with a great
cooking-range, and, indeed, every convenience the men could desire. We
carried eight guns--9-pounders--for we were going into seas where it
would be necessary to be well-armed, and constantly on our guard against
treachery; and we were also amply supplied with boats, which, I may
remark, were always kept in good order, and ready for instant use. I
was surprised one day during a calm, before we had been long at sea, to
hear the order given to lower boats when there was no ship in sight, and
apparently no reason for it. So were those of the crew who had not
before sailed with Captain Frankland. They, however, flew to obey the
order, and, in a short time, three boats were manned and in the water.
They were then hoisted in again, and stowed.

"Very well," said the captain, holding his watch in his hand. "Smartly
done, my lads; but another time, I think, we may do it still quicker."

Some of the men, of course, grumbled, as I have found out that some
people will grumble when any new system is introduced, the object of
which they do not understand. The loudest grumbler at anything new
introduced on board was old Fleming the boatswain. He called himself a
Conservative, or, rather, a Tory, and strongly opposed all change.

"None of your newfangled notions for me," he used to observe; "I like
things as they were. Do you think our fathers would have all along been
satisfied with them if they hadn't been good? I look upon it as
disrespectful to their memory to wish to have them changed, as if we
thought ourselves so much wiser and better than they were."

Gerard and I were fond of going forward to the forecastle, where, in
fine weather, in an evening, he always took his seat with his pipe in
his mouth.

"By the same rule it was wrong to introduce the compass or the
steam-engine; former generations had done very well without them; yet
how should we, on a dark night, have managed to steer across the ocean
as we do,