[ London Times ]
This newspaper, most correctly known simply as The Times, began publication in 1785 and continues to this day.
The October 10, 1832 edition of The Times carried the following description of a sailor giving himself a treat upon his return from India:
JACK IN HIS GLORY. — A most amusing scene occurred on Monday afternoon on the river. The notice of every one was attracted to a wherry, rowed up against wind and tide, in which a jolly sailor, just returned from India, was sitting beside his
doxy, whom he was fondling in the most loving, if not the most delicate manner. He had a pipe in his mouth, and a slender cane in his hand, which he flourished about in all the abandonment of freedom and ecstasy. Behind him was a large shaggy Newfoundland dog, and before him was seated a musician, with a huge drum and Pandean pipes, which Jack insisted on his playing without intermission. In his progress he was cheered by the sailors in the vessels and barges, and the boatmen and others on the wharfs, and by the different parties in the drinking-rooms overlooking the river. On his arrival at St. Katherine's wharf, Jack, leaving Susan to be handed out by the boatman, started up, and (which added greatly to the keeping of the scene) exhibited a wooden leg, which he threw out, and with the agility, and somewhat of the manner of a kangaroo, hopped upon his one foot on shore, amid the greetings of a concourse of persons assembled to witness his landing. A boatman was despatched for a coach, into which the jolly tar stowed himself with his fair companioin and the Newfoundlander, after perching the musician, with his drum and pipes, upon the box beside the coachman, with orders to strike up "Rule Britannia," to which inspiring tune Jack was driven off, amid the shouts of the spectators, to whom he good-humouredly waved his hat from the window. It was such as scene as Smollett would have immortalized.