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WHEN I struck the beach in Havre, the war with England had turned adrift upon that port s dock heads a strange assortment of men. Many had served in either the American or English navy, and many more had manned French privateers and had fought under Napoleon s eagles. The peace that had followed turned hordes of these fighting men into peaceable merchant sailors without ships, and they drifted about without definite means of sup port. I had come over from the States in an old tub of a barque called the Washington, after having served as mate for two years on the schooner General Greene. The war had taught me something, for I had served in the navy in one of the South Pacific cruises, and had fought in the frigate Essex. I was only a boy in years, but the service and other matters hardly worth mentioning here had hardened my nature and developed the disagreeable side of my character. I was mate of the old hooker, and could have made out well enough if the captain hadn t been somewhat down on me, for I never cared especially for women, and I believed my experience justified my opinion of them, but no matter. The old man seemed to think I couldnt be happy without thrashing every day one or more of the miserable dagoes he had had the assurance to tell me were sailors, and, after a nasty voyage of fifty days, I was not sorry to step ashore. I joined the saturnine pier-enders with my pay and discharge as being a remarkably hard and quarrelsome mate with but small experience.

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9781515284550

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