I escaped from these syrens without being bound to the mast, like
Ulysses; but, like him, I had nearly fallen a victim to a modern
Polyphemus; for though he had not one eye in the middle of his
forehead, after the manner of his prototype, yet the rays from both
his eyes meeting together at the tip of his long nose, gave him very
much that appearance. Ignorance, sheer ignorance, in this, as in many
other cases, was the cause of my disaster. A party of officers, in
full uniform, were coming from a court-martial. "Oh ho!" said I, "here
come some of us." I seized my dirk in my left hand, as I saw they held
their swords, and I stuck my right hand into my bosom as some of them
had done. I tried to imitate their erect and officer-like bearing;
I put my cocked-hat on fore and aft, with the gold rosette dangling
between my two eyes, so that in looking at it, which I could not help
doing, I must have squinted. And I held my nose high in the air, like
a pig in a hurricane, fancying myself as much an object of admiration
to them as I was to myself. We passed on opposite tacks, and our
respective velocities had separated us to the distance of twenty or
thirty yards, when one of them called out to me in a voice evidently
cracked in His Majesty's service--"Hollo, young gentleman, come back
here."

I concluded I was going to be complimented on the cut of my coat, to
be asked the address of my tailor, and to hear the rakish sit of my
hat admired. I now began to think I should hear a contention between
the lords of the ocean, as to who should have me as a sample middy on
their quarter-decks; and I was even framing an excuse to my father's
friend for not joining his ship. Judge then of my surprise and
mortification, when I was thus accosted in an angry and menacing tone
by the oldest of the officers--