) Certainly he is no physician, they say. But, on the
other hand, a conjecture that he has been before the mast is as
plausible a one as that ever Herman Melville was; there is the true
sailor's-roll about him; nobody less skilful than the captain of a
three-decker could have run the Agra through such a gantlet of
broadsides and hurricanes; the manoeuvring of the ship, when her
master puts her before the wind that he may rake one schooner's deck and
hurl the majestic monster bodily upon the other, is unequalled by
anything in nautical literature, and approached by nothing in verity,
except it may be Admiral Dupont's waltz of fire around the two forts of
Hilton Head. Another, who laughs at both of these amateur statements,
has a Grub-Street one; but, except to a favored few, to everybody in
this country he is only an impersonal existence. In this general dearth
of useful information, there are, however, one or two biographical
sketches afloat,--possibly hints of those waiting their chance in the
pigeon-holes of the Thunderer,--of which we are tempted to give the
reader a sample, brought to us by Una in substantiation of her
hostilities.
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