I soon began to climb the rigging of the brig, ascending to the
mast-heads. One day Mr. Marchinton saw me quite at the main-truck; and,
calling me down, I got a severe flogging for my dexterity and enterprise.
It sometimes happens that punishment produces a result exactly opposite to
that which was intended; and so it turned out in the present instance. My
desire to be a sailor increased in consequence of this very flogging; and
I now began seriously to think of running away, in order to get to sea, as
well as to escape a confinement on shore, that, to me, seemed
unreasonable. Another prize, called the Amsterdam Packet, a Philadelphia
ship, had been sent in by, I believe, the Cleopatra, Sir Robert Laurie. On
board this ship were two American lads, apprentices. With these boys I
soon formed an intimacy; and their stories of the sea, and their accounts
of the States, coupled with the restraints I fancied I endured, gave rise
to a strong desire to see their country, as well as to become a sailor.
They had little to do, and enjoyed great liberty, going and coming much as
they pleased. This idleness seemed, to me, to form the summit of human
happiness. I did not often dare to play truant; and the school became
odious to me. According to my recollections, this desire for a change must
have existed near, or quite a twelvemonth; being constantly fed by the
arrival and departure of vessels directly before my eyes, ere I set about
the concocting of a serious plan to escape.

My project was put in execution in the summer of 1805, when I could not
have been more than eleven years old, if, indeed, quite as old. I was in
the market one day, and overheard some American seamen, who had been
brought in, conversing of a schooner that was on the point of leaving
Halifax, for New York. This vessel belonged to North Carolina, and had
been captured by the Driver, some time before, but had been liberated by a
decision of the Admiralty Court. The men I overheard talking about her,