Wooden walled Gomorrahs of the deep
Melville finally mentions the unmentionable:
"What too many seamen are when ashore is very well known; but what some of them become when completely cut off from shore indulgences can hardly be imagined by landsmen. The sins for which the cities of the plain were overthrown still linger in some of these wooden-walled Gomorrahs of the deep. More than once complaints were made at the mast in the Neversink, from which the deck officer would turn away with loathing, refuse to hear them, and command the complainant out of his sight."
Melville, H., (2000), White-Jacket or the World in a Man-of-War, Northwestern University Press, pp 375-6.
"What too many seamen are when ashore is very well known; but what some of them become when completely cut off from shore indulgences can hardly be imagined by landsmen. The sins for which the cities of the plain were overthrown still linger in some of these wooden-walled Gomorrahs of the deep. More than once complaints were made at the mast in the Neversink, from which the deck officer would turn away with loathing, refuse to hear them, and command the complainant out of his sight."
Melville, H., (2000), White-Jacket or the World in a Man-of-War, Northwestern University Press, pp 375-6.