Page:The Naval Officer (1829), vol. 1.djvu/215

launched out on the poor midshipmen, they reminded me of the trembling bird which, when fascinated by the eye of the snake, loses its powers, and falls at once into the jaws of the monster. When much excited, he had a custom of shaking his shoulders up and down, and his epaulettes, on these occasions, flapped like the huge ears of a trotting elephant. At the most distant view of his person or sound of his voice, every midshipman, not obliged to remain, fled, like the land-crabs on a West-India beach. He was incessantly taunting me, was sure to find some fault or other with me, and sneeringly called me " one of your frigate midshipmen." Irritated by this unjust treatment, I one day answered that I was a frigate midshipman, and hoped I could do my duty as well as any line-of-battle-ship midshipman, of my own standing, in the service. For this injudicious, and rather impertinent remark, I was ordered aft on the quarter-deck, and the captain went in to the admiral, and asked permission to flog me; but