It May Seem Strange That In Such A State Of Affairs The Captain Should
Be Willing To Keep The Sea With His Ship.
But the truth was, that by
lying in harbour, he ran the risk of losing the remainder of his men
by desertion; and as it was, he still feared that, in some outlandish
bay or other, he might one day find his anchor down, and no crew to
weigh it.
With judicious officers the most unruly seamen can at sea be kept in
some sort of subjection; but once get them within a cable's length of
the land, and it is hard restraining them. It is for this reason that
many South Sea whalemen do not come to anchor for eighteen or twenty
months on a stretch. When fresh provisions are needed, they run for
the nearest land - heave to eight or ten miles off, and send a boat
ashore to trade. The crews manning vessels like these are for the most
part villains of all nations and dyes; picked up in the lawless ports
of the Spanish Main, and among the savages of the islands. Like
galley-slaves, they are only to be governed by scourges and chains.
Their officers go among them with dirk and pistol - concealed, but
ready at a grasp.
Not a few of our own crew were men of this stamp; but, riotous at
times as they were, the bluff drunken energies of Jennin were just
the thing to hold them in some sort of noisy subjection.
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