Captain Frederick Marryat (1792-1848) was a contemporary and acquaintance of Charles Dickens and an English Royal Navy officer known for a widely used system of maritime flag signaling. Poor Jack tell the story of tells Thomas Saunders, a sailor"s son and neglected street urchin struggling to survive in Greenwich, London in the early 19th century; The Settlers in Canada follows a reasonably well-off family who lose their English estate and emigrate to a settlement near Lake Ontario.