ound, disabled, or paralysed with terror. Many escaped into shoal
water, others ran ashore, some were sunk, and about twenty taken
possession of by the ships of the squadron. They proved to be part of a
convoy, laden with wine, and bound to the Garonne.

One of the _chasse-marees_, being a larger vessel than the rest, and
laden with wine of a better quality, was directed by the commodore to be
sent to England; the casks of wine on board of the others were hoisted
into the different ships, and distributed occasionally to the crews.
Captain M--- thought that the departure of the prize to England would be
a favourable opportunity to send our hero to receive his outfit, as he
could not well appear on the quarter-deck as an officer without his
uniform. He therefore directed the master's mate, to whose charge the
prize was about to be confided, to take William with him, and wrote to
his friends at Portsmouth, whither the vessel was directed to proceed,
to fit him out with the requisite articles, and send him back by the
first ship that was directed to join the squadron. The prize was
victualled, the officer received his written orders, was put on board
with our hero and three men, and parted company with the squadron.

The master's-mate, who was directed to take the vessel to Portsmouth,
was the spurious progeny of the first-lieutenant of a line-of-battle
ship, and a young woman who attended the bum-boat, which supplied the
ship's company with necessaries and luxuries, if they could afford to
pay for them. The class of people who obtain their livelihood by these
means, and who are entirely dependent upon the navy for their
subsistence, are naturally anxious to secure the good-will of the
commanding officers of the ships, and usually contrive to have on their
establishment a pretty-looking girl, who, although very reserved to the
junior officers of the ship, is all smiles to the first-lieutenant, and
will not stand upon trifles for the benefit of her employer. Beauty for
men--gold for women! Such are the glittering baits employed, in this
world, to entice either sex from the paths of duty or discretion.

The service was indebted to this species of bribery for the officer in
question. The interest of his supposed father was sufficient to put him
on the quarter-deck; and the profits of his mother, who, having duly
served her apprenticeship, had arrived to the dignity of bumboat woman
herself, and was a fat, comely matro