When a ship required sails and a captain, in the 1700's. Were sailors paid well? Did they work shifts, or did they sleep and work and sleep and work?
I've written quite a bit about working conditions for sailors in the Royal Navy, which may help to answer your question, although conditions were different in the merchant fleet (very generally speaking, the merchant sailors were paid better but there were far fewer of them per ship). In the Royal Navy, at least, sailors were paid a decent wage at the beginning of the 1700s, but the wage for sailors was frozen throughout most of the century and so its purchasing power declined over time.
To quote from a previous answer on the subject:
Speaking again very broadly, the distinction between merchant and naval ships in the 17th and 18th century was related to type of mission. During this time period we see ships being standardized into "rates" (in England/Britain) and the beginnings of ship "class" design -- that is, ships being built to a particular plan, within the limits of technology of the time. The largest naval ships could be outfitted with up to 100 guns, of various types, and crewed by more than 800 officers, sailors and Marines, with increasing specialization in the officer class. By contrast, merchant ships would have significantly smaller crews -- small coasting vessels might have a husband-and-wife team aboard; colliers or those engaged in trade in the Baltic or Mediterranean might have a crew of 20 or 30; and whaleships engaged in multiyear voyages might only have 40 or 50 men aboard. So the overwhelming distinction for life on a naval ship vs. a merchant ship would be the size of the crew and the subsequent crowding. Standards of discipline for the crew would also be substantially different. I'll take these in two parts:
- First, crew size. Naval ships had a need for many more men than merchant ships due to the mission of ships in the navy. While merchantmen needed a crew to actually sail the ship, stand watch, unload cargo, etc., most of these jobs would be performed in sequence. Merchant captains paid their crews (by wages or as a percentage of cargo value; there were several arrangements), so there was some incentive to keep crews small. By contrast, naval ships needed many more men to simultaneously sail and fight the ship — in battle, men would be used to trim the sails, repair damage, send messages, fight with muskets, and fight the great guns. Each gun on a naval ship might have a crew of three (for a carronade) up to eight or nine (for the long guns); multiply that manning requirement by a broadside of up to 50 guns, and you understand the need for very large crews.
- The large crews and crowding meant that naval discipline was much more strict than merchant discipline. The old stereotype of the tyrannical naval captain is somewhat of a myth, but discipline was extremely strict. I'm speaking more from the English/British experience than that in other navies, because it's what I'm more familiar with, but seamen would stand rigid watches. Starting (hitting with a knotted rope's end), kicking, punching, etc., was common and unremarkable. There were a range of punishments ranging from withholding grog up to whipping for offenses committed on board (blasphemy, gambling, theft, etc.), and capital punishment was a last resort. None of these punishments was remarkable for the day, and sailors generally did not complain about the nature of the punishment; the mutinies that we read about generally resulted from men feeling that punishment was arbitrary or unfair, or that conditions were not what they were promised. (I should note that whipping was a common punishment even on pirate ships, where crews often set standards.)
Regarding officers, naval ships would have many more of them, and as the age of sail drew onwards, they became much more specialized. Again speaking very broadly, merchant captains were always sailors first, whereas naval captains started as soldiers. As naval combat evolved over the centuries, the English/British navy in particular retained two distinct roles for sailors: a master (sailing master) who was responsible for navigation was distinct from the captain of the ship (who would originally have been a soldier, and only later became a person skilled at sailing). By the time of the Napoleonic wars, British ships would have both commissioned officers aboard and non-commissioned (warrant) officers. The commissioned officers would include the captain, a first lieutentant/executive officer, a number (depending on ship rate) of lieutenants, and a lieutenant (or more) of Marines. The noncommissioned officers would include roles such as the master, purser, surgeon, boatswain, carpenter, gunner, and cook. In a limbo between would be midshipmen -- teenagers learning the craft, with the goal of earning a commission. By contrast, merchant ships might sail with just a captain, first mate and several skilled seamen filling the warrant/petty officer role.
Here are some answers that may be of interest to you:
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/2oo91z/during_the_age_of_sail_how_reliable_were/