John Holdsworth, Chief Mate

All next morning Holdsworth kept watch for Dolly and his child, but did not see them. But Mr. Conway had passed when Mrs. Parrot happened to be in the room laying the cloth for...

At five o’clock the wind was south-east; a fresh breeze, with a lively sea and a cloudy sky. The wind being aft, the ship sailed on an even keel, to the great comfort of the pas...

How was Holdsworth to get a living? For what was he fit? He was a good clerk; Mr. Sherman had called him so, at least; Hanwitch was a tolerably large place, and he ought to find...

It was natural, after the first liveliness of the emotion which had been excited in Mrs. Parrot’s breast by the installation of a lodger worth fourteen shillings a week to her,...

The little irritable man had brought true news. The report was all over the town: everybody was talking of Conway’s death. A woman living in the road called upon Mrs. Parrot to...

In a period of English history which graybeards call the good old times--the fine old times; that is to say, when Parliament was horribly corrupt, and the Poor Laws as barbarous...

Johnson lifted his head and looked about him; and first for the ship that had passed them in the night--but she was nowhere visible; then at Holdsworth, whose delirium had yield...

In the fine old times--the good old times--a short journey took a long time; and it was evening when the Gravesend coach put Holdsworth down at the door of an old inn in Southwa...

A storm broke over Hanwitch that night, and left behind it a strong wind which swept up great masses of clouds; and the morning sunshine streamed and darkened in quick alternati...

By twelve o’clock they had baled the long-boat out and got her over the ship’s side, a task of no small difficulty, since, the main-mast being gone, they had no means of slingin...

A fourth day broke, and found the boat almost becalmed again. The intense tedium of their captivity cannot be expressed by words. The eternal iteration of the water-line became...

In the year 1832, within a week or two of the date that would make the time exactly five years since the “Meteor” lay off Gravesend, waiting to embark her captain and start for...

Not knowing how to address or speak to Holdsworth, the skipper and Mr. Sherman and the others called him Mr. H., that letter being all they knew of his name.

The “Meteor” was a full-rigged ship of eleven hundred tons, with painted ports and a somewhat low freeboard, which gave her a rakish look. Her figure-head represented a woman, n...

Hanwitch is nowhere seen to greater advantage than from the summit of the little hill that flanks it on the west. Here, if you are an epicure in your enjoyment of what is pictur...

A barque of about six hundred tons, named the “Jessie Maxwell,” three weeks out from the port of Glasgow, having been becalmed all night, was standing south, with all sail set,...

At midnight Holdsworth came on deck to relieve the second mate. A man out of the port watch came to the wheel, and stood yawning, scarcely awake. The night was dark--a hazy atmo...

In these days half that number of men would be thought ample to handle a ship of eleven hundred tons. Taking fourteen men as a ship’s company, we find--one, the cook, who is use...

Right in the middle of the road stood Holdsworth, casting his eyes first to the right, then to the left, then letting them rest fixedly on the house at the extremity.

The old stage-coach, the Wellerian coachman, the spruce guard with his horn and his jokes, the fat people inside, the gruff people outside, all contributed a picturesque detail...

The cabin in which Holdsworth lay was a spare one, next the captain’s. It was lighted by an oblong piece of frosted glass let into the deck overhead, and by a port-hole which wa...

As no object could be served by keeping the sail hoisted, they hauled it down and spread a portion of it over the widow and her child. Holdsworth kept watch till ten, and then a...

“Mr. Holdsworth,” said the General, “will you not let me watch whilst you get some sleep? You have been up now for nearly three nights running, and I beg you to consider the pre...

Mrs. Parrot was despatched to request Mrs. Conway’s leave that Nelly might stop to tea with Mr. Hampden, and returned to say that “the little gal might, with the greatest of ple...

The “Jessie Maxwell” was bound for Sydney, New South Wales, freighted with what is called a general cargo--pianos, nails, scents, and such matters. She carried only one passenge...

Holdsworth spent the greater part of the evening in writing a letter to Mr. Sherman. At twelve o’clock next day he was an inmate of Mrs. Parrot’s house in the Ellesmere Road.

Holdsworth regained his strength slowly, and on the fourth day Mr. Sherman, who attended him with the gentle and unobtrusive solicitude of a perfectly benevolent mind, suggested...

The dawn awoke Johnson, who remained seated for some time motionless, with his open eyes fixed upon the sea half-way to the horizon. As he continued gazing, a wild smile of joy...

At six o’clock next morning the sleeping passengers were awakened by cries and trampings which, to some of them at least, were novel disturbers of their slumbers. They might hav...

At nine o’clock on the morning of the third day from the time occupied in the last chapter, a hand stationed on the look-out in the fore-top sent a roar from the sky:

The fowl dished up by the landlady and served upon fine linen, was plump, and juicy and aromatic enough to re-excite the appetite of an alderman after Mansion House dinner; but...