else--in the navy phrase--preparing to pay their creditors _with
a flying fore-topsail_. On the poop, the captain was looking to
windward; and in his grand, inaccessible cabin, the high and
mighty commodore sat silent and stately, as the statue of Jupiter
in Dodona.

We were all arrayed in our best, and our bravest; like strips of
blue sky, lay the pure blue collars of our frocks upon our
shoulders; and our pumps were so springy and playful, that we
danced up and down as we dined.

It was on the gun-deck that our dinners were spread; all along
between the guns; and there, as we cross-legged sat, you would
have thought a hundred farm-yards and meadows were nigh. Such a
cackling of ducks, chickens, and ganders; such a lowing of oxen,
and bleating of lambkins, penned up here and there along the
deck, to provide sea repasts for the officers. More rural than
naval were the sounds; continually reminding each mother's son of
the old paternal homestead in the green old clime; the old
arching elms; the hill where we gambolled; and down by the barley
banks of the stream where we bathed.

"All hands up anchor!"

When that order was given, how we sprang to the bars, and heaved
round that capstan; every man a Goliath, every tendon a hawser!--
round and round--round, round it spun like a sphere, keeping time
with our feet to the time of the fifer, till the cable was
straight up and down, and the ship with her nose in the water.