Читать книгу The Sea: Its Stirring Story of Adventure, Peril, & Heroism (Vol. 1-4). The History of Sea Voyages, Discovery, Piracy and Maritime Warfare онлайн

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Strange to say, the very same week in which the men of the Portsmouth fleet returned to their duty, acknowledging all their grievances to be removed, the fleet at the Nore arose in a violent state of mutiny, displaying very different attributes to those shown by the former. Forty thousand men, who had fought many a battle for king and country, and in steadfast reliance upon whose bravery the people rested every night in tranquillity, confident in their patriotism and loyalty, became irritated by ungrateful neglect on the one part, and by seditious advisers on the other, and turned the guns which they had so often fired in defence of the English flag against their own countrymen and their own homes.

Richard Parker, the chief ringleader at the Nore, was a thoroughly bad man in every respect, and one utterly unworthy the title of a British sailor, of which, indeed, he had been more than once formally deprived. He was the son of an Exeter tradesman in a fair way of business, had received a good education, and was possessed of decided abilities. He was a remarkably bold and resolute man, or he would never have acquired the hold he had for a time over so many brave sailors. He was unmistakably