around which lay gardens and fields. It was on this side of the town
that the local aristocracy lived. And who were the great people of
this small town? Not the younger branches of the county families
that held hereditary state in their manor-houses on the wild bleak
moors, that shut in Monkshaven almost as effectually on the land
side as ever the waters did on the sea-board. No; these old families
kept aloof from the unsavoury yet adventurous trade which brought
wealth to generation after generation of certain families in
Monkshaven.

The magnates of Monkshaven were those who had the largest number of
ships engaged in the whaling-trade. Something like the following was
the course of life with a Monkshaven lad of this class:--He was
apprenticed as a sailor to one of the great ship-owners--to his own
father, possibly--along with twenty other boys, or, it might be,
even more. During the summer months he and his fellow apprentices
made voyages to the Greenland seas, returning with their cargoes in
the early autumn; and employing the winter months in watching the
preparation of the oil from the blubber in the melting-sheds, and
learning navigation from some quaint but experienced teacher, half
schoolmaster, half sailor, who seasoned his instructions by stirring
narrations of the wild adventures of his youth. The house of the
ship-owner to whom he was apprenticed was his home and that of his
companions during the idle season between October and March. The
domestic position of these boys varied according to the premium
paid; some took rank with the sons of the family, others were
considered as little better than servants. Yet once on board an
equality prevailed, in which, if any claimed superiority, it was the
bravest and brightest. After a certain number of voyages the
Monkshaven lad would rise by degrees to be captain, and as such