Chapter 7 - Page 2

from high life
find an asylum among the mob.

Some Commodores are very particular in seeing to it, that no man
on board the ship dare to dine after his (the Commodore's,) own
dessert is cleared away.--Not even the Captain. It is said, on
good authority, that a Captain once ventured to dine at five,
when the Commodore's hour was four. Next day, as the story goes,
that Captain received a private note, and in consequence of that
note, dined for the future at half-past three.

Though in respect of the dinner hour on board a man-of-war, _the
people_ have no reason to complain; yet they have just cause,
almost for mutiny, in the outrageous hours assigned for their
breakfast and supper.

Eight o'clock for breakfast; twelve for dinner; four for supper;
and no meals but these; no lunches and no cold snacks. Owing to
this arrangement (and partly to one watch going to their meals
before the other, at sea), all the meals of the twenty-four hours
are crowded into a space of less than eight! Sixteen mortal hours
elapse between supper and breakfast; including, to one watch,
eight hours on deck! This is barbarous; any physician will tell
you so. Think of it! Before the Commodore has dined, you have
supped. And in high latitudes, in summer-time, you have taken
your last meal for the day, and five hours, or more, daylight to
spare!

Mr. Secretary of the Navy, in the name of _the people_, you
should interpose in this matter. Many a time have I, a maintop-
man, found myself actually faint of a tempestuous morning watch,
when all my energies were demanded--owing to this miserable,
unphilosophical mode of allotting the government meals at sea. We
beg you, Mr. Secretary, not to be swayed in this matter by the
Honourable Board of Commodores, who will no doubt tell you that
eight, twelve, and four are the proper hours for _the people_ to
take their Meals; inasmuch, as at these hours the watches are
relieved. For, though this arrangement makes a neater and cleaner
thing of it for the officers, and looks very nice and superfine
on paper; yet it is plainly detrimental to health; and in time of
war is attended with still more serious consequences to the whole
nation at large. If the necessary researches were made, it would
perhaps be found that in those instances where men-of-war
adopting the above-mentioned hours for meals have encountered an
enemy at night, they have pretty generally been beaten; that is,
in those cases where the enemies' meal times were reasonable;
which is only to be accounted for by the fact that _the people_
of the beaten vessels were fighting on an empty stomach instead
of a full