Read "Sweeney Todd, the Barber of Fleet Street" by Anonymous online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
The earliest dawn of morning was glistening on the masts, the cordage, and sails of a fleet of vessels lying below Sheerness.
Over the taffrail of one, in particular, a large-sized merchantman, which had been trading in the Indian seas, two men were leaning. One of them was the captain of the vessel, and the other a passenger, Colonel Jeffery, who intended leaving that morning. They were engaged in earnest conversation, and the captain, as he shaded his eyes with his hand, and looked along the surface of the river, said, in reply to some observation of his companion: "I'll order my boat the moment Lieutenant Thornhill comes on board. I call him lieutenant, although I have no right to do so, because he has held that rank in the King's service, but when young, was cashiered for fighting a duel with his superior officer."