A Fire Alight!

An excerpt from the anonymous account of a sailor stationed on the foretop of the merchant vessel Good Intent, describing the events of the year 1840 and subsequent, first published in London in the year 1851. Often, it seems to me, at the most pivotal moments in our lives, the fates taunt us with strains of music. And so it was on the morning I embarked upon the most significant voyage I took upo…