The Log of a Privateersman | Page 4

time of receiving Mr White's
offer, I had not found time to do more than just become aware of the
fact that Mr Joe Martin, our local ship-builder, happened to have a very
fine craft upon the stocks, well advanced toward completion. Now,

however, that it had come about that I was to serve on board that same
craft as "dickey", I was all impatience to see what she was like; so, the
next day happening to be fine, I set off, the first thing after breakfast,
and, walking in to Weymouth, made my way straight to the shipyard.
As I reached the gates I caught my first near view of her, and stood
entranced. She was planked right up to her covering-board, and while
one strong gang of workmen was busy fitting her bulwarks, another
gang, upon stages, was hard at work caulking her, a third gang under
her bottom, having apparently just commenced the operation of
coppering. She was, consequently, not presented to my view in her
most attractive guise; nevertheless, she being entirely out of the water, I
was able to note all her beauties, and I fell in love with her on the spot.
She was a much bigger craft than I had expected to see; measuring, as I
was presently told, exactly two hundred and sixty-six tons. She was
very shallow, her load-line being only seven feet above the lowest part
of her unusually deep keel, but this was more than counterbalanced by
her extraordinary breadth of beam. She had a very long, flat floor, and,
despite her excessive beam, her lines were the finest that I had ever
seen--and that is saying a great deal, for I had seen in the West Indies
some of the most speedy slavers afloat. Altogether she impressed me as
a vessel likely to prove not only phenomenally fast but also a perfect
sea-boat. She was pierced for four guns of a side, with two stern-
chasers; and there was a pivot on her forecastle for a long eighteen-
pounder; she would therefore carry an armament formidable enough to
enable us to go anywhere and do anything--in reason. Having
thoroughly inspected her from outside, and gone down under her
bottom, I next made my way on board, and went down below to have a
look at her interior accommodation. This I found to be everything that
could possibly be desired; the arrangements had evidently been
carefully planned with a view to securing to the crew the maximum
possible amount of comfort; the cabins were large, and as lofty as the
shallow depth of the vessel would allow; there was every convenience
in the state-rooms in the shape of drawers, lockers, sofas, folding tables,
shelves, cupboards, and so on; and the living quarters were not only
light, airy, and comfortable, but were being finished off with great taste
and considerable pretensions to luxury. While I was prowling about
below I encountered Harry Martin, the son of the builder, who told me

that Mr White, when completing the purchase of the vessel, had given
instructions that no reasonable expense was to be spared in making the
craft as thoroughly suitable as possible for the service of a privateer. I
spent fully two hours on board, prying into every nook and cranny of
the vessel, and making myself thoroughly familiar with the whole of
her interior arrangements, and then left, well satisfied with my
prospects as second mate of so smart and comfortable a craft.
As I was crossing Hope Square, toward the foot of Scrambridge Hill,
on my way home again, I met Captain Winter, who, after
congratulating me upon my appointment, informed me that he had
secured carte blanche from the owner as to the number of the crew, and
that he was determined to have the vessel strongly manned enough to
enable her to keep at sea even after sending away a prize crew or two.
He was therefore anxious to secure as many good men as possible, and
he suggested that I could not better employ my spare time than in
looking about for such, and sending to him as many as I could find.
This I did; and as the skipper and Mr Lovell, the chief mate, were both
industriously engaged in the same manner, we contrived, by the time
that the schooner was ready for sea, to scrape together a crew of ninety
men, all told--a large proportion of whom were Portlanders,--as fine
fellows, for the most part, as ever trod a plank.
The schooner was launched a fortnight from the day upon which I had
first visited her, and as she slid off the ways Joe Martin's youngest
daughter christened her, giving her the name of the Dolphin. She was
launched with her two lower-masts in, and