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Daddy was a Protestant and a farmer, but by the time I came along around 1540, he had become a preacher. Although I will have numerous and intimate encounters with royalty later in life, I'm proud to say that I come from common parents.

I never took well to the farming life -- too much dirt under the fingernails. Even though I'm the oldest of the twelve drake children, I could not inherit my father's land, which he held by a grant from the Earl of Bedford. By thirteen, I had taken a position as cabin boy on a cargo barque trading in the North Sea. It takes a certain type of man to work the sea and survive, and boys especially have to take special care about who they adopt as mentors. Luckily captain Waterhouse beat me less than most other captains were inclined to treat their boys, and the Captain didn't allow just anyone to have the services of his new boy.

Mother, Mary, didn't shed a tear as I left on the evening Post for Dover. I think she looked forward to one less mouth to feed, and my mouth had become particularly abusive toward my mother -- something for which I feel great shame today. But if she were to have heard the filth that would issue forth from my adolescent lips when aboard ship, she would have gone pale and locked me in a room alone with the bible.