Similar to Joseph Conrad's better-known Heart of Darkness, Youth begins with a narrator describing five men drinking claret around a mahogany table. They are all veterans of the merchant navy. The main character, Marlow, tells the story of his first voyage to the East as second mate on board the Judea. The story is set twenty-two years earlier, when Marlow was 20. With two years of experience, most recently as third mate aboard a crack clipper, Marlow receives a billet as second mate on the barque Judea. The skipper is Captain John Beard, a man of about 60. This is Beard's first command. The Judea is an old boat, belonging to a man "Wilmer, Wilcox or something similar", suffering from age and disuse in Shadewell basin. The 400-ton ship is commissioned to take 600 tons of coal from England to Thailand. The trip should take approximately 150 days. The ship leaves London loaded with sand ballast and heads north to the Senn river to pick up the cargo of coal. On her way, the Judea suffers