The Sun.
London, England, 1839-12-31 00:00:00

A FEMALE SAILOR.

Extract from a letter from an officer of the Robert
Small, dated in that ship off the Cape of Good Hope,
the 20th of October, 1839. The Robert Small sailed
from London last August
A very singular case has been discovered on board
our ship ; we have detected a young lady in the person
of a sailor who has come out with our crew from the
time we left the Thames until it was found that she
belonged to the lair sex.
" Her name is Mary Anne Arnold. She is the
daughter of the late Lieutenant Arnold of the Royal
Navy, who served in that capacity on board the Ganges
and Prince Regent men-of-war. Being a man of dis-
solute habits he lost his commission in consequence, after
which he resided with his wife at Sheerness, where, by
continuing his habits of dissipation, he and his family
were reduced to great distress. By the intercession of
some friends Mr. Arnold was admitted a pensioner in
Greenwich Hospital, in which asylum he died recently.
During the latter interval and after her husband's
death:Mrs. Arnold lived at Sheerness, supporting her-
self and her children by manual labour until the summer
of 183.5, when, after great exertion in the harvest field,
she was attacked by bilious fever and died, leaving her
children totally unprovided for. Mrs. Arnold's furniture
was sold to pay the expenses of her funeral, and some
charitable neighbours took the orphans into their
houses and supported them for a time.
" Mary Anne, the subject of the present statement,
was ten years oath when her mother died. Partly by
labouring in the fields, and partly by going on errands,
she at first supported herself, and contributed to the
sustenance of her little sister, who was only eighteen
months old when her mother died. Mary Anne next
obtained permanent employment in a rope factory at
Sheerness, where she earned two shillings and sixpence
a week. Going frequently in boats and amongst the
shipping, she found that the boys of her age who went
to sea earned more money, were better fed. thought
more of,' and in every way in a superior condition to
her's. Upon this Mary Anne determined to renounce
the petticoats and to become a sailor. Borrowing an
old jacket, trousers, and shirt from a boy of her ac-
quaintance, to whom she said she was going to have a
lark in them, she took leave of the rope fields and the
owner of the clothes, without the ceremony of a fare-
well, and succeeded, to her great joy, in getting em-
ployment as a cabin-boy in the Williams, a Sunderland
collier, then lying at Sheerness. Mary Anne was
kindly treated, and she continued to do the miscel-
laneous hard work of a collier's cabin-boy below and
aloft for two years and two months, to the satisfaction
of no less than six captains, who successively com-
manded the Williams during that period. A seventh
captain came, and this time man and boy did not like
each other, so Mary Anne for ever abandoned the coal-
marine and its blackamoor service, and on the 22d of
October, 1831, entered as cabin-boy at Shields on
board the brig Annie, bound fot London and Quebec.
She made several voyages in this vessel. Unfortu-
nately the Annie was wrecked off Blakeriey in the last
equinoctial gales ; but the captain and crew had the
luck to escape after enduring great hardships. Return-
ing to Shields, Miss Arnold entered again as a cabin-
boy in the Choice, bound for London, with stores for
the Robert Small East lndiaman, in which ship she
next succeeded in getting an engagement as a sailor-
boy the day before she sailed from London.
" She has well done her work as a strong active boy

We understand that in consequence of the rutin-,
ber of persons, 4,, seceding 1,300, who are entitled to. be
present at the Royal marriage, her Majesty has desired
a communication to be made to the Archbishop of Can-
terbury and Bishop of London, and it is possible the
august ceremony may be solemnised in St. George's
Chapel, Windsor. Until this question is determined,
the preparations are still continued at the Royal Chapel,
St. James's, where new galleries and seats to see the
procession ore being erected ; but we repeat, that it
will not contain above five hundred persons. The
Marquis of Conyngham, K.P., and the Earl of Gros-
venor, are to proceed early in January with the in-
signia of the Order of the Garter, to invest Prince
Albert of Saxe Coburg, who will not arrive here till
the day before his marriage. Her Majesty is, we
hear, anxiousto have the nuptial ceremony performed
on Saturday the Bth, or, at the latest, on Monday
the 10th of February.—Argue.
The Nottingham Review says, the Relief Com-
mittee, up to Monday morning last, has distributed
1,120 stone of bread, and eleven sacks of potatoes.
During the period since our last report, 1,200 persons
have been relieved by the Visiting Committee, and the
town has been divided into districts, but visitors are
wanted. The Committee have employed upon the Fo-
rest 496 m.en with families. The number of persons
provided with two rnea!s a-day, at the workhouse, had
diminished to 70 on Tuesday last ; that mode of relief,
therefore, for the present, is discontinued. Some of
the parties were referred to the Relief Fund Commit-
tee, a few were taken into the workhouse, and others
have been relieved in a different manner ; 150 persons
are at present enployed by the Guardians.

London: Printed and Vimi,sbed by MURDO YOUNG, of
No. 112, Strand, at 74, Sp,. Office, No. 112, Strand, in the
county of Middlesex.—Tuesday, December 31, 1839.