The Ocean Wave

As I left the house she said I was a cruel old thing, and not a bit nice, and she hoped I never, never would come back. So I shipped as mate on the Mudlark, bound from London to wherever the captain might think it expedient to sail. It had not been thought advisable to hamper Captain Abersouth with orders, for when he could not have his own way, it had been observed, he would contrive in some ingenious way to make the voyage unprofitable. The owners of the Mudlark had grown wise in their generation, and now let him do pretty much as he pleased, carrying such cargoes as he fancied to ports where the nicest women were. On the voyage of which I write he had taken no cargo at all; he said it would only make the Mudlark heavy and slow. To hear this mariner talk one would have supposed he did not know very much about commerce.