Sinopsis

Have any of you made a age on board a steamer between London and Leith? If you have, you will have seen no small number of brigs and brigantines, with sails of all tints, from doubtful white to decided black--some deeply-laden, making their way to the southward, others with their sides high out of the water, heeling over to the slightest breeze, steering north. On board one of those delectable craft, a brig called the Naiad, I found myself when about fourteen summers had ed over my head. She must have been named after a negress naiad, for black was the prevailing colour on board, from the dark, dingy forecastle to the captain's state cabin, which was but a degree less dirty than the portion of the vessel in which I was destined to live.