SKETCHES OF NAVAL AND MILITARY ABYENTURE. BY ONE IN THE SERVICE. BATH: BINNS AND GOODWIN. LONDON: WHITTAKER AND CO. FRIENDS! WHO IN THE HOUR OF MENTAL INQUIETUDE AND PECUNIARY EMBARRASSMENT HAVE COMFORTED AND AIDED ME, TO YOU THIS WORK IS DEDICATED. PREFACE. THOUGH divided into parts, each assigned to a distinct character, this book is almost AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. It is not altogether so, for then indeed must the writer have possessed either a two-fold existence, or the power of ubiquity. It has been his lot, however, to figure in various characters on the stage of life; to see much of the world; to devote a great portion of his years to his country's service; to meet with strange adventures; and (shall he not gratefully acknowledge it?) by the bounty of an all-wise Providence, after having escaped many and imminent dangers, to sit down once more in dear England; and, feeling that he is privileged beyond numbers who were his companions in exile and enterprise, recal some of those scenes amid which he has heretofore moved. |