Two Years Before the Mast by Richard Henry Dana Jr.

His writing evidences his later social feeling for the oppressed. The term 'before the mast' refers to sailor's quarters - in the forecastle, in the bow of the ship, the officers dwelling near the stern. He kept a diary, and after the trip wrote Two Years Before the Mast based on his experiences.

He returned to Massachusetts aboard the ship Alert on September 22, 1836, after two years away from home. On the 180-ton, 86.5 foot-long Pilgrim, Dana visited a number of settlements in California (including Monterey, San Pedro, San Juan Capistrano, San Diego, Santa Barbara, and Santa Clara and San Francisco).

He left Boston on the brig Pilgrim on August 14, 1834, on a voyage around Cape Horn to the then-remote California, at that time still a part of Mexico. Rather than going on a Grand Tour of Europe, he decided to enlist as a common sailor, despite his high-class birth. In his junior year, he had a case of measles which also caused ophthalmia and his weakening vision inspired him to take a sea voyage. In July 1831, Dana began his studies at Harvard College, though he was suspended for six months before the end of his first year for supporting a student protest. In 1825, Dana enrolled in a private school overseen by Ralph Waldo Emerson, who Dana later mildly praised as 'a very pleasant instructor', though he lacked a 'system or discipline enough to insure regular and vigorous study'. He also often pulled students by their ears and, on one such occasion, nearly pulled Dana's ear off, causing his father to protest enough that the practice was abolished. Barrett was infamous as a disciplinarian, punishing his students for any infraction by flogging. As a boy, Dana studied in Cambridgeport under a strict schoolmaster named Samuel Barrett, alongside fellow Cambridge native and future writer James Russell Lowell. In 1825, Dana enrolled in a private school overseen by Ralph Waldo Emerson, who Dana later mildly praised as 'a very pleasant instructor', though he lacked a 'system or discipline enough to insure Dana was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts on August 1, 1815, into a family that first settled in colonial America in 1640.

Dana was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts on August 1, 1815, into a family that first settled in colonial America in 1640.

Two Years Before the Mast by Richard Henry Dana Jr.