Except the cook, who was a Fin

In the course of our conversation, he informed me that he had a snug birth aboard the Hercules, merchantman. This vessel was built in the Gulph of Finland, burthen 800 tons. She was two years on the stocks, composed entirely of fir and pine, except her knees, which were oak. The axe and long Finland knife were the only tools employed. The saw and the plane were excluded. The hands were Swedes, except the cook, who was a Fin, and it was well for him, that he did not understand the Swedish language, for the poor fellow often thought they were prasing his culinary powers, when they were cursing him.

The memoirs and adventures of Mark Moore, late an officer in the British navy. 1795