to "disable her from putting to sea" when the spring came. Here, too,
the privateering spirit was to blame, Rhode Island being notorious for
its enterprise in that form of piracy. Another impenitent sinner in
her inroads upon the companies of king's ships was Boston, where "a
sett of people made it their Business" to entice them away. [Footnote:
_Admiralty Records_ 1. 1440--Capt. Askew, 27 Aug. 1748.] No ship
could clean, refit, victual or winter there without "the loss of all
her men." Capt. Young, of the _Jason_, was in 1753 left there
with never a soul on board except "officers and servants, widows' men,
the quarter-deck gentlemen and those called idlers." The rest had been
seduced at 30 Pounds per head. [Footnote: _Admiralty Records_ 1.
2732--Capt. Young, 6 Oct. 1753. The "widows' men" here humorously
alluded to would not add much to the effectiveness of the depleted
company. They were imaginary sailors, borne on the ship's books for
pay and prize-money which went to Greenwich Hospital.]

So it went on. Day in, day out, at home and abroad, this ceaseless
drain of men, linking hands in the decimation of the fleet with those
able adjutants Disease and Death, accentuated progressively and
enormously the naval needs of the country. For the apprehension and
return of deserters from ships in home ports a drag-net system of
rewards and conduct-money sprang into being; but this the sailor to
some extent contrived to elude. He "stuck a cockade in his hat" and
made shift to pass for a soldier on leave; or he laid furtive hands on
a horse and set up for an equestrian traveller. In the neighbourhood
of all great seaport towns, as on all main roads leading to that
paradise and ultimate goal of the deserter, the metropolis,
horse-stealing by sailors "on the run" prevailed to an alarming
extent; and although there was a time when the law strung him up for
the crime of borrowing horses to help him on his way, as it had once