This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated.1836 Excerpt: ... a proof how much a reform is wanted in the conduct of officers both in the navy and the marines. Having safely landed our freight, and bearing no orders to go on any particular service, we prepared for our return to old England, and arrived at Portsmouth in the latter end of the year, when I quitted, and took my leave of the naval service. Postscript. The career of a youthful nautical frolic being ended, the mind has had time to reflect, and by an examination of the past, it has prepared me somewhat to shape my course for the future, as experience is the best teacher. In contemplating the varied scenes of so motley a profession as that of a sailor, there is much to be thought on with pleasure, and much with a bitter anguish and disgust. To the youth possessing any thing of a roving disposition it is attractive, nay, it is seducing; for it has its allurements, and when steadily pursued and with success, it ennobles the mind, and the seaman feels himself a man. There is, indeed, no profession that can vie with it; and a British seaman has a right to be proud, for he is incomparable when placed alongside those of any other nation. Great Britain can truly boast of her hearts of oak, the floating sinews of her existence, and the high station she holds in the political world; and if she could but once rub out those stains of wanton and torturing punishments, so often unnecessarily resorted to, and abandon the unnatural and uncivilized custom of impressment, then, and not till then, can her navy be said to have got to the truck of perfection. In the first, a radical reform in her officers is the only means to effect it; for did these men but think a little more of national honor, and a little less of self-importance, there would be less difference between the bell...
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