Georgian jobs • Page 2
Fancy helping wrinkly old folks into the baths at Bath and pulling even more wrinkly ones out?
You'll encounter the public in all shapes and sizes. Wading through the scum-topped waters of life, you'll support all manner of festering bodies and assist in the sponging down of their repulsive skin. With horrific ailments abounding, you'll need a strong stomach, especially when it's time for helping with the towelling down.
However, there is one big bonus of this job – it comes with a free fake tan courtesy of the iron-stained waters.
Have you got the balls to stand in front of an audience and be an opera superstar? Great, then let us snatch them away from you using hot water, manual manipulation, sharp scissors and copious amounts of cheap alcohol. Wow, will you hit those high notes then! Opera fans the world over will adore you, and groupies will wear medallions bearing your portrait.
If you're too young to agree to the operation, let your family do it for you. After all, there are financial rewards for those who tackle this difficult decision. They won't even have to admit to having you castrated deliberately – they can always come up with a medical alibi (a riding accident, accidental blow, animal bite).
There's no need to worry about the effects that a lack of hair and an obese, deformed body will have on your chances of having a companion for life. Great fame and fortune will always illuminate your inner beauty to others.
A young boy is sought to serve as the loblolly boy aboard the newly constructed warship, HMS Victory. 'Loblolly' is a thick porridge sometimes containing a bit of meat or some vegetables, given to the sick. Among much else, it is the loblolly boy's job to feed this dainty dish to ailing seamen on board ship.
To assist the ship's surgeon, you will ideally have a range of skills in stock-taking, home economics, client care and surgery. A strong stomach and steady nerve are essential. Duties will include the issue of all supplies, provisions and hospital stores and cleaning the cockpit and all the medical equipment.
During operations, you will be responsible for providing charcoal to heat the irons used to sear amputated stumps and for heating the tar applied to stop haemorrhages. You may also be asked to gather up the severed limbs and throw them overboard. In the hierarchy of the ship, you will be somewhere between the cabin boy and a ship's rat – but, then, the only way is up!
Scale to new career heights as a ship's topman. Ever wondered what all those strange, romantic-sounding nautical phrases – such as 'heave the braces' and 'trim the sheets' – really mean? Well, this is your chance to find out.
You'll be king of the world up on the main top sail of an 18th-century war ship like HMS Victory, hauling up the rigging and responsible for up to 37 sails in fair weather or foul. After half a pint of rum and water, you'll be dancing on the main yard without a care in the world even though you are 62.4 metres (205 feet) above the deck.
A comfortable hammock (packed into a tight and airless space on a lower deck) is provided where you can recover from your earlier exuberance. There's also plenty more food and drink, though you will be sharing both with numerous bugs and beetles.
Can you keep calm in a crisis? Women and children are needed to help win the maritime war against Napoleon Bonaparte. Nerves of steel and a good level of concentration are required by those who will supply the brave gun crews aboard our naval ships with gunpowder in the heat of battle.
You need a good pair of legs to shoot down to the copper-lined magazine where you will fill your powder keg, before charging back up the stairs and through the ship, stepping over dead bodies and slipping in blood, to bring your keg to the gunner. But if you're a woman, don't expect to get a naval service medal when all the fighting is over – you'll be refused.
Not happy as a child in a well-to-do family home? Want to sail the seven seas? The job of midshipman may be just what you're looking for.
As an 11- or 12-year-old boy, you can step into the man's world of life onboard ship. Work alongside gnarly old sea dogs, dodgy-looking swabbers, and ogre-like capstan haulers three times your age. In your smart officer's uniform, you'll stand out among the crew like a cold sore at a singles party. If the food is really bad, you may even find that they'll eat you for breakfast.
Struggling with the change from your childhood environment, you'll have to earn your keep by measuring the speed of the ship using the knotted line. This can be backbreaking when the rope is wet and the length has to be hauled aboard, together with its heavy wooden float. But fear not – you are being trained to become one of the naval elite, and once you've passed your navigation exams, you'll be stepping on the ladder to a captaincy. Who knows? – if you survive the harsh life, you could even make admiral.
For more about life on the high seas in the 18th and early 19th century, see Nelson's Navy.
