While  we  lay  in  the  harbor  of  Rio  de  Janeiro,  I  had  a
very  Wonderful  escape  from  drowning.     I  had  been  over


LEAVING  HOME.  21

the  side  scraping  the  gangway  steps,  but  losing  my  hold
I  fell  overboard  ;  and  as  all  hands  were  holystoning  the
decks,  my  cries  were  not  heard  I  had  sunk  twice,  and
come  again  to  the  surface,  but  being  unable  to  swim,  I
was  just  going  down  for  tlie  third  time,  when  a  midship-
man providentially  looking  over  the  quarter,  saw  me,  as
the  tide  was  carrying  me  astern.  He  threw  a  coil  of
rope  over  my  head,^which  I  grasped  and  was  saved,  to
my  great  joy  and  to  the  satisfaction  of  my  shipmates,
with  whom  I  was  somewhat  of  a  favorite.  Having
cruised  for  three  years  on  the  coast  of  South  America,
encountering  heavy  gales  on  both  sides  of  the  Horn,  and
passing  through  more  than  the  ordinary  vicissitudes  of  a
sea  life,  I  returned  home  to  my  mother.  No  longer  the
innocent  boy  I  was  when  I  left  her,  but  a  hardened  sin-
ner, and  a  confirmed  drunkard  and  blasphemer,  although
not  yet  sixteen  years  of  age.  After  a  stay  of  a  few  weeks
ashore,  1  left  home  and  friends  once  more  to  resume  my
wanderings  on  the  wide  waste  of  waters.
My  next  ship  was  a  merchantman  ;  she  was  chartered
by  the  government  to  carry  convicts.  We  took  on
board  three  hundred  of  them  from  a  disabled  ship  at
Cork,  to  be  carried  to  Van  Dieman's  land.  A  few  nights
after  we  had  received  them,  a  fatal  disease  broke  out
among  them,  and  thirty  souls  were  taken  from  us  in  the
course  of  a  week.  Here  I  was  familiar  with  death  again,
but  remained  as  careless  and  thoughtless  as  ever.
