and which, if comparisons must be made, equals, if it does not far
exceed them in utility. I allude to that large and very important body
of strictly professional persons who are not remarkable for anything
in particular, unless it be for a hearty and uncompromising devotion
to the service. Captains, it is to be feared, are generally too apt to
consider these meritorious persons as less entitled to attention than
their more showy companions; just as schoolmasters are, not
unnaturally, disposed to devote most of their time to the cleverest
boys, to the comparative neglect of those who cluster round the point
of mediocrity. It may, however, be easily conceived that the persons
least attended to, afloat as well as on shore, often stand more in
need of notice and assistance than their gifted brethren, who are
better able to make their own consequence felt and acknowledged; for
it must not be forgotten that these honest, hard-working men actually
perform the greater part of all the routine drudgery of the service,
and perhaps execute it better than men of higher talents could do in
their place.

The class amongst us who devote themselves to sober literary pursuits
is necessarily very small; but that of the happy youths, who dream the
gods have made them poetical, has many members, who "rave, recite, and
madden round the ship," to their own (exclusive) satisfaction. Others
there are who deal desperately in the fine arts of painting and
music,--that is, who draw out of perspective, and play out of tune:
not that the ability to sketch the scenes and phenomena continually
passing before them is objectionable; I allude here to the pretenders
to art. Their poor messmates can have little respect for these
pretending Rembrandts and Paganinis; and the happiness of the mess
would be considerably improved if authority were given to pitch every
such sketch-book and every flute out at the stern-port.