Chapter Seven.

Chapter Seven.We go out to Spithead.Passing across the gangway with Commander Nesbitt to the hulk, which served as a sort of floating hotel for all of us while theCandaharwas preparing for sea, officers and men alike sleeping and messing in her and only going on board our own ship during working hours between meals, as long as daylight lasted, I found Dr Nettleby, the chief of our medical staff, with one of his assistants, busily engaged in the sick bay on the main deck.They were examining all the new hands who had just joined, to see whether any of them were suffering from organic disease, or some other physical infirmity that might incapacitate them for service afloat, none but the able-bodied being accepted.The curtained door of the sick bay being open and the cabin itself close to the main hatchway, which I had necessarily to pass in going below to the gunroom, I could not help overhearing something of what was proceeding in the medical sanctum, the more especially from the fact of Dr Nettleby, the presiding genius, having a short temper and a snappy manner of expressing himself peculiarly his own.He was a good-hearted man at the bottom, however, and as tender as a woman in cases of real suffering; though woe to the malingerer or shammer of illness who incautiously ventured within reach of his caustic tongue!A couple of the cadets who had come on board with me that morning were standing by the doorway of the sick bay, in company with one of the older midshipmen and some others; and, seeing these all grinning, as if enjoying themselves mightily at what was going on within, I joined the group—the lot of us sheltering ourselves from observation behind a tall canvas screen that was rigged across the deck amidships, shutting out the draught from the port-holes fore and aft, besides serving also as an ante-room to the doctor’s cabin and surgery. From this inner apartment would emerge ever and anon some culprit marine or shamefaced seaman, trying to walk steady, who, having perhaps been a trifle too jolly overnight and pleading indisposition as an excuse for his inability to attend to his duties, had been brought before the doctor for treatment—only, alas! to receive a dose of pungent satire, in lieu of the soothing medicine they craved to banish the effects of their drunken spree. Meanwhile, the new hands who were awaiting their medical examination were drawn up on the other side of the gangway, “marking time” until these regular, or rather irregular, patients were disposed of in turn, no doubt enjoying the fun like ourselves.“Listen,” whispered Larkyns, the senior midshipman, nudging the fellow next him and winking to me as I came up. “That’s Macan, our corporal of marines, who’s getting it now. By Jove, the doctor is giving it him hot!”He certainly was, judging from what reached my ears, at least.“Stuff and nonsense, corporal!” I heard Dr Nettleby rasp out snappishly, his voice sounding from within the cabin just like a terrier dog barking, for I could hear him plainly enough. “You can’t gammon me, my man, though you might take in the first lieutenant! It’s ‘rumatism,’ not rheumatism you’re suffering from, you scoundrel! You’ve been drinking, that’s what’s the matter with you; and if I report you to the cap’en, as I ought, you’ll not only lose your stripes before sunset, but get four dozen as well, and serve you right, too!”“Faith, yer honour, I haven’t tasted a dhrop of anythin’ barrin’ tay since yesterday noon at Eight Bells. May I die this minnit if I have, sor,” boldly asserted the accused in a rich Irish brogue that was as distinct as the doctor’s voice. “It’s the rheumaticks, sure! I’ve got ’em in the legs bad this toime and can’t hould mesilf up at all, nor walk more than a choild!”“Macgilpin, just diagnose this case for me,” cried the doctor to his assistant. “What does he smell of?”“Whuskey,” replied the assistant-surgeon, a rawboned expert from Edinburgh, who had only recently donned Her Majesty’s uniform and brought his north-country accent with him when he came southwards. “There’s nae doot aboot that. He smells o’ whuskey, and bad whuskey, tae!”“Begorrah, yer nose is wrong, sor, and the doctor’s roight, as he always is, sor, beggin’ yer pardon,” said the culprit, confessing his offence in his anxiety to stand up for the medical insight of the chief, with whom he had served before and whose professional pride he knew how to work upon. “It was rhum, sure enough.”“You rascal!” shouted out Dr Nettleby. “Why, not a moment ago you swore you hadn’t tasted a drop of anything but tea alone since yesterday.”“Faith, yer honner, I didn’t know it wor rhum till too late, sor. I sware, sor, I droonk it out av a taypot.”“Out of a teapot, man?”“Yis, sor, I’ll till yer honner how it wor, sure,” explained the wily fellow, who could tell from the doctor’s change of tone that his offence was condoned and that he need fear no worse consequences now than one of his usual lectures, which only went in at one ear and out at the other, as Dr Nettleby himself said. “I wint over to the rendywoo last noight be the cap’en’s orders, sor, fur to say if there wor any more hands awaitin’ to jine. Faith an’ there I mates me wife’s first cousin, Bridget O’Halloran, as is merried now be the same token to Sargint Lintstock.”“Sergeant Lintstock?”“Ay, sor, that same, which makes him, sure, me second cousin once removed, though, faith, he’s me soupayrior orfiser! But, as I were a-tellin’ ye, sor, in comes Bridget whilst I were talkin’ to the jintleman behoind the bar at the rendywoo. I were jist axin’ what the cap’en tells me to axe him; an’ ‘Mike,’ says she, cordial like, ‘have a partin’ glass wid me fur the sake of the ould country as ye’re abut to lave.’“‘Faith an’ that’s more nor I dare, Bridget,’ says I. ‘I promist the docthor, sure, I wouldn’t touch another dhrop o’ sperrits for the nixt four-an’-twenty hours, as I’m a livin’ sinner!’“‘But I don’t want ye to dhrink sperrits,’ says she. ‘Me an’ me frind Mistress Wilkins here is jist havin’ a cup of tay, sure; an’ axes ye to jine us, that’s all!’“‘Faith I’m not the bhoy fur to disobleege the ladies,’ says I, ‘ye can give us a cup, if that’s all ye wants me fur to do.’ Wid that, Bridget ups with the taypot, a little brown one it wor, sure, by the same token, an’ pours me out a cupful in a mug that lay handy sure on the counther, which I drinks to the hilth of her an’ Missis Wilkins as wor standin’ by. It wor right-down beautiful tay; so I has another one to the hilth of Bridget’s husband the sarjint, an’ thin another, that wor a little one faith! to the hilth of the babby; an’, begorrah, sor, I rimimbers no more till this mornin’ whin I fales so bad wid the rheumatics as I couldn’t lift me hid out of me hammock. The sarjint says I wor droonk, but I worn’t, sor; though somehows or t’other I thinks it must have been rhum I wor drinkin’ at the rendywoo an’ not tay as Bridget telled me at the toime, sayin’ it wor good fur the stummick an’ wud kape the cowld out!”“I don’t believe a word of your story,” I heard the doctor answer to this long and circumstantial yarn. “Why, Macan, you’re drunk now!”“Me droonk now, sor?” repeated the other in a tone of mingled sorrow and solemnity. “Faith I’m as sobher as a jidge this very minnit, as I’m a livin’ sinner!”“Don’t tell me any more of your lies!” cried out the doctor irascibly at this juncture, interrupting what further asservation the corporal might have made in support of his unblushing assertion. “You can go forrud now and thank your stars I don’t report you, as I had more than half a mind to at first. If I did, you’d be put into the black list and lose your stripes to a dead certainty.”“May the saints presarve yer honner,” exclaimed Macan with effusion as he was thus dismissed, but he was still not satisfied apparently at his word being doubted; for, as he passed us, working his way forward by a series of short tacks, he kept on muttering half aloud, much to our amusement, “It’s all through that blissid Scotch sawbones wid his long ‘dog nose’ as he calls it, sayin’ it wor whisky. I’m as shober as a jidge, faith—as shober as a jidge!”No more unfortunate circumstance, however, could have occurred for the corporal of marines, in spite of the doctor having let him off so easily, for, through our overhearing this dialogue between the two, the yarn he had told of meeting his “cousin Bridget” soon got round the ship, and the men could always put him in a rage whenever they liked by an allusion to the “taypot” and his cousin’s friend “Missis Wilkins.”We stopped a little longer listening outside the sick bay, but soon gave up the pastime, nothing occurring to interest us during the medical examination of the new hands, a fresh batch of whom came aft, by the way, at Four Bells; for all of them were quickly passed by the doctor and were detailed for duty aloft and below, where many jobs were at a standstill for want of men.This enabled the commander to press on with the work of rigging the ship, the crossjack, or “crochet” yard being sent up by the aid of the mizzen burton hooked on in front of the top; after which the jack was slung and the trusses fixed on, the spar brought home to the mast, the lifts and braces having been fitted before swaying, as is the case with all the lower yards in men-of-war.The mizzen-trysail mast, on which the spanker is set, was also got up by means of the same tackle; and, what with hoisting in some of the main deck guns and sails and other gear, the afternoon quickly passed.I was not sorry when dinner-time came, Five Bells in the first dog watch, for I was pretty well tired to death with this, my first day’s experience on board theCandahar, in running up and down the decks fore and aft as Commander Nesbitt’s special messenger. It was, however, a very good introduction to the life I should have to lead for the next few years of my career; for, as a junior officer, I would be at the beck and call of everyone on the quarter-deck and “hardly able to call my soul my own,”—as Dad had more than once warned me beforehand.Still, I must say, notwithstanding certain drawbacks, which subsequent experience brought to light in due course, I liked it all, taking the rough side of sea life with the smooth, and would not change my lot if I had the opportunity of making my choice over again, even knowing what I do now of the service!My captain I had not as yet seen much of; for, although he came off every day to sign papers and receive reports, as well as see how things were going on generally, he lived on shore and did not interfere at all with Commander Nesbitt, who carried on the work as he pleased.The latter being a good officer, who thoroughly knew his duty and a sailor every inch of him, as I have already described, Captain Farmer, as he probably well understood, could not have done better than thus leave matters to his second in command while the ship was in harbour.The Honourable Digby Lanyard, our first lieutenant, was a tall supercilious young man of five-and-twenty or so who wore an eyeglass.This was more for effect than from any defect of vision, for he was as sharp as a needle; and could see a bit of spunyarn adrift or a rope out of place aloft even quicker than the commander, keen-sighted as he was.Amongst the men on the lower deck, who have, as a rule, some pet nickname for most of their officers, especially those whom they may chance to like or dislike more than the rest, he always went by the sobriquet of “glass-eye”; and it was wonderful how this dandy chap who was so particular in his dress and would mince his words in conversation with his brother officers in the wardroom, speaking with a lisp of affectation and a languid air as if it were too much trouble to articulate distinctly, would, when the occasion arose, roar out his orders in a voice that could be heard from one end of the ship to the other and make the men skip about, like the young lambs mentioned by the Psalmist!As for us youngsters, we dreaded his icy contemptuous stare and his “haw-haw” manner more than anything.He seemed to have the power of freezing us with a look should he ever condescend to notice us at all; but this, fortunately, was very seldom, the lieutenant being wont to ignore our existence except when he had reason to call us to account for some neglect of duty, at which times we disliked more his disdainful glance, accompanied, as it invariably was, by some cold sarcastic allusion to our shortcomings, than the bullying and bad language of some of the other officers who were not so refined.Such at all events was the opinion Dick Andrews and Teddy Allison and the other cadets had of him, as well as myself; though Fred Larkyns, the big senior midshipman, who patronised us and whom we all liked, he was such a jolly fellow and up to all sorts of fun, said we would find “glass-eye” not half a bad chap “when we came to know him better.”Subsequent events will tell how far Mr Larkyns proved to be right in this conclusion of his; albeit, we demurred to it at the time that he propounded it in his dogmatic way, rapping poor little Teddy Allison on the head with a parallel ruler, which he held in his hand at the moment, for daring to dispute his oracular assertion on the point and making us all laugh by a capital imitation of the haughty airs of our pet aversion and his cynical mode of speech, while in the same breath he took his part, generous lad that he was!We were all too busy, however, to notice the various peculiarities and characteristics of our messmates beyond such as we were brought more immediately in contact with.Indeed, we had not time even to settle down on board and know each other properly; for each day added to our company, increasing the number of strange faces around us, so that I began to wonder when we would at length get our requisite complement and finish our apparently endless task of fitting out.“It is a long lane that has no turning,” though, as the old adage goes; and so, after three weeks more of enrolling volunteers at Corporal Macan’s favourite “rendywoo,” and the hoisting in of many guns and boats and stores and provisions of all sorts, until theCandahar, I thought, would never contain them all, we finally bent our sails, crossed royal yards and were declared “ready for sea.”Captain Farmer came on board with “all his bag and baggage” on our ship’s company “turning over” from the old hulkBlake, to which we all bade a long and welcome adieu, all hands being then mustered by divisions to beat of drum along the upper and lower decks.We were eight hundred strong, all told; officers and men; bluejackets of all ratings, and marines; boys and “idlers,” as some of the hardest-worked fellows aboard are somewhat inappropriately designated in the watch bill, according to nautical etiquette; as motley a collection at the first start, and yet as fine a set of fellows as you could pick out in a year’s cruise!These preliminaries being all arranged, we cast off from the hulk late one November afternoon; and, the dockyard tugPuffing Billytaking us in tow, proceeded to Spithead, where we anchored in eleven fathoms, letting out some six shackles of cable, so that we could swing comfortably with the tide as it flowed in and out of the roadstead.

Passing across the gangway with Commander Nesbitt to the hulk, which served as a sort of floating hotel for all of us while theCandaharwas preparing for sea, officers and men alike sleeping and messing in her and only going on board our own ship during working hours between meals, as long as daylight lasted, I found Dr Nettleby, the chief of our medical staff, with one of his assistants, busily engaged in the sick bay on the main deck.

They were examining all the new hands who had just joined, to see whether any of them were suffering from organic disease, or some other physical infirmity that might incapacitate them for service afloat, none but the able-bodied being accepted.

The curtained door of the sick bay being open and the cabin itself close to the main hatchway, which I had necessarily to pass in going below to the gunroom, I could not help overhearing something of what was proceeding in the medical sanctum, the more especially from the fact of Dr Nettleby, the presiding genius, having a short temper and a snappy manner of expressing himself peculiarly his own.

He was a good-hearted man at the bottom, however, and as tender as a woman in cases of real suffering; though woe to the malingerer or shammer of illness who incautiously ventured within reach of his caustic tongue!

A couple of the cadets who had come on board with me that morning were standing by the doorway of the sick bay, in company with one of the older midshipmen and some others; and, seeing these all grinning, as if enjoying themselves mightily at what was going on within, I joined the group—the lot of us sheltering ourselves from observation behind a tall canvas screen that was rigged across the deck amidships, shutting out the draught from the port-holes fore and aft, besides serving also as an ante-room to the doctor’s cabin and surgery. From this inner apartment would emerge ever and anon some culprit marine or shamefaced seaman, trying to walk steady, who, having perhaps been a trifle too jolly overnight and pleading indisposition as an excuse for his inability to attend to his duties, had been brought before the doctor for treatment—only, alas! to receive a dose of pungent satire, in lieu of the soothing medicine they craved to banish the effects of their drunken spree. Meanwhile, the new hands who were awaiting their medical examination were drawn up on the other side of the gangway, “marking time” until these regular, or rather irregular, patients were disposed of in turn, no doubt enjoying the fun like ourselves.

“Listen,” whispered Larkyns, the senior midshipman, nudging the fellow next him and winking to me as I came up. “That’s Macan, our corporal of marines, who’s getting it now. By Jove, the doctor is giving it him hot!”

He certainly was, judging from what reached my ears, at least.

“Stuff and nonsense, corporal!” I heard Dr Nettleby rasp out snappishly, his voice sounding from within the cabin just like a terrier dog barking, for I could hear him plainly enough. “You can’t gammon me, my man, though you might take in the first lieutenant! It’s ‘rumatism,’ not rheumatism you’re suffering from, you scoundrel! You’ve been drinking, that’s what’s the matter with you; and if I report you to the cap’en, as I ought, you’ll not only lose your stripes before sunset, but get four dozen as well, and serve you right, too!”

“Faith, yer honour, I haven’t tasted a dhrop of anythin’ barrin’ tay since yesterday noon at Eight Bells. May I die this minnit if I have, sor,” boldly asserted the accused in a rich Irish brogue that was as distinct as the doctor’s voice. “It’s the rheumaticks, sure! I’ve got ’em in the legs bad this toime and can’t hould mesilf up at all, nor walk more than a choild!”

“Macgilpin, just diagnose this case for me,” cried the doctor to his assistant. “What does he smell of?”

“Whuskey,” replied the assistant-surgeon, a rawboned expert from Edinburgh, who had only recently donned Her Majesty’s uniform and brought his north-country accent with him when he came southwards. “There’s nae doot aboot that. He smells o’ whuskey, and bad whuskey, tae!”

“Begorrah, yer nose is wrong, sor, and the doctor’s roight, as he always is, sor, beggin’ yer pardon,” said the culprit, confessing his offence in his anxiety to stand up for the medical insight of the chief, with whom he had served before and whose professional pride he knew how to work upon. “It was rhum, sure enough.”

“You rascal!” shouted out Dr Nettleby. “Why, not a moment ago you swore you hadn’t tasted a drop of anything but tea alone since yesterday.”

“Faith, yer honner, I didn’t know it wor rhum till too late, sor. I sware, sor, I droonk it out av a taypot.”

“Out of a teapot, man?”

“Yis, sor, I’ll till yer honner how it wor, sure,” explained the wily fellow, who could tell from the doctor’s change of tone that his offence was condoned and that he need fear no worse consequences now than one of his usual lectures, which only went in at one ear and out at the other, as Dr Nettleby himself said. “I wint over to the rendywoo last noight be the cap’en’s orders, sor, fur to say if there wor any more hands awaitin’ to jine. Faith an’ there I mates me wife’s first cousin, Bridget O’Halloran, as is merried now be the same token to Sargint Lintstock.”

“Sergeant Lintstock?”

“Ay, sor, that same, which makes him, sure, me second cousin once removed, though, faith, he’s me soupayrior orfiser! But, as I were a-tellin’ ye, sor, in comes Bridget whilst I were talkin’ to the jintleman behoind the bar at the rendywoo. I were jist axin’ what the cap’en tells me to axe him; an’ ‘Mike,’ says she, cordial like, ‘have a partin’ glass wid me fur the sake of the ould country as ye’re abut to lave.’

“‘Faith an’ that’s more nor I dare, Bridget,’ says I. ‘I promist the docthor, sure, I wouldn’t touch another dhrop o’ sperrits for the nixt four-an’-twenty hours, as I’m a livin’ sinner!’

“‘But I don’t want ye to dhrink sperrits,’ says she. ‘Me an’ me frind Mistress Wilkins here is jist havin’ a cup of tay, sure; an’ axes ye to jine us, that’s all!’

“‘Faith I’m not the bhoy fur to disobleege the ladies,’ says I, ‘ye can give us a cup, if that’s all ye wants me fur to do.’ Wid that, Bridget ups with the taypot, a little brown one it wor, sure, by the same token, an’ pours me out a cupful in a mug that lay handy sure on the counther, which I drinks to the hilth of her an’ Missis Wilkins as wor standin’ by. It wor right-down beautiful tay; so I has another one to the hilth of Bridget’s husband the sarjint, an’ thin another, that wor a little one faith! to the hilth of the babby; an’, begorrah, sor, I rimimbers no more till this mornin’ whin I fales so bad wid the rheumatics as I couldn’t lift me hid out of me hammock. The sarjint says I wor droonk, but I worn’t, sor; though somehows or t’other I thinks it must have been rhum I wor drinkin’ at the rendywoo an’ not tay as Bridget telled me at the toime, sayin’ it wor good fur the stummick an’ wud kape the cowld out!”

“I don’t believe a word of your story,” I heard the doctor answer to this long and circumstantial yarn. “Why, Macan, you’re drunk now!”

“Me droonk now, sor?” repeated the other in a tone of mingled sorrow and solemnity. “Faith I’m as sobher as a jidge this very minnit, as I’m a livin’ sinner!”

“Don’t tell me any more of your lies!” cried out the doctor irascibly at this juncture, interrupting what further asservation the corporal might have made in support of his unblushing assertion. “You can go forrud now and thank your stars I don’t report you, as I had more than half a mind to at first. If I did, you’d be put into the black list and lose your stripes to a dead certainty.”

“May the saints presarve yer honner,” exclaimed Macan with effusion as he was thus dismissed, but he was still not satisfied apparently at his word being doubted; for, as he passed us, working his way forward by a series of short tacks, he kept on muttering half aloud, much to our amusement, “It’s all through that blissid Scotch sawbones wid his long ‘dog nose’ as he calls it, sayin’ it wor whisky. I’m as shober as a jidge, faith—as shober as a jidge!”

No more unfortunate circumstance, however, could have occurred for the corporal of marines, in spite of the doctor having let him off so easily, for, through our overhearing this dialogue between the two, the yarn he had told of meeting his “cousin Bridget” soon got round the ship, and the men could always put him in a rage whenever they liked by an allusion to the “taypot” and his cousin’s friend “Missis Wilkins.”

We stopped a little longer listening outside the sick bay, but soon gave up the pastime, nothing occurring to interest us during the medical examination of the new hands, a fresh batch of whom came aft, by the way, at Four Bells; for all of them were quickly passed by the doctor and were detailed for duty aloft and below, where many jobs were at a standstill for want of men.

This enabled the commander to press on with the work of rigging the ship, the crossjack, or “crochet” yard being sent up by the aid of the mizzen burton hooked on in front of the top; after which the jack was slung and the trusses fixed on, the spar brought home to the mast, the lifts and braces having been fitted before swaying, as is the case with all the lower yards in men-of-war.

The mizzen-trysail mast, on which the spanker is set, was also got up by means of the same tackle; and, what with hoisting in some of the main deck guns and sails and other gear, the afternoon quickly passed.

I was not sorry when dinner-time came, Five Bells in the first dog watch, for I was pretty well tired to death with this, my first day’s experience on board theCandahar, in running up and down the decks fore and aft as Commander Nesbitt’s special messenger. It was, however, a very good introduction to the life I should have to lead for the next few years of my career; for, as a junior officer, I would be at the beck and call of everyone on the quarter-deck and “hardly able to call my soul my own,”—as Dad had more than once warned me beforehand.

Still, I must say, notwithstanding certain drawbacks, which subsequent experience brought to light in due course, I liked it all, taking the rough side of sea life with the smooth, and would not change my lot if I had the opportunity of making my choice over again, even knowing what I do now of the service!

My captain I had not as yet seen much of; for, although he came off every day to sign papers and receive reports, as well as see how things were going on generally, he lived on shore and did not interfere at all with Commander Nesbitt, who carried on the work as he pleased.

The latter being a good officer, who thoroughly knew his duty and a sailor every inch of him, as I have already described, Captain Farmer, as he probably well understood, could not have done better than thus leave matters to his second in command while the ship was in harbour.

The Honourable Digby Lanyard, our first lieutenant, was a tall supercilious young man of five-and-twenty or so who wore an eyeglass.

This was more for effect than from any defect of vision, for he was as sharp as a needle; and could see a bit of spunyarn adrift or a rope out of place aloft even quicker than the commander, keen-sighted as he was.

Amongst the men on the lower deck, who have, as a rule, some pet nickname for most of their officers, especially those whom they may chance to like or dislike more than the rest, he always went by the sobriquet of “glass-eye”; and it was wonderful how this dandy chap who was so particular in his dress and would mince his words in conversation with his brother officers in the wardroom, speaking with a lisp of affectation and a languid air as if it were too much trouble to articulate distinctly, would, when the occasion arose, roar out his orders in a voice that could be heard from one end of the ship to the other and make the men skip about, like the young lambs mentioned by the Psalmist!

As for us youngsters, we dreaded his icy contemptuous stare and his “haw-haw” manner more than anything.

He seemed to have the power of freezing us with a look should he ever condescend to notice us at all; but this, fortunately, was very seldom, the lieutenant being wont to ignore our existence except when he had reason to call us to account for some neglect of duty, at which times we disliked more his disdainful glance, accompanied, as it invariably was, by some cold sarcastic allusion to our shortcomings, than the bullying and bad language of some of the other officers who were not so refined.

Such at all events was the opinion Dick Andrews and Teddy Allison and the other cadets had of him, as well as myself; though Fred Larkyns, the big senior midshipman, who patronised us and whom we all liked, he was such a jolly fellow and up to all sorts of fun, said we would find “glass-eye” not half a bad chap “when we came to know him better.”

Subsequent events will tell how far Mr Larkyns proved to be right in this conclusion of his; albeit, we demurred to it at the time that he propounded it in his dogmatic way, rapping poor little Teddy Allison on the head with a parallel ruler, which he held in his hand at the moment, for daring to dispute his oracular assertion on the point and making us all laugh by a capital imitation of the haughty airs of our pet aversion and his cynical mode of speech, while in the same breath he took his part, generous lad that he was!

We were all too busy, however, to notice the various peculiarities and characteristics of our messmates beyond such as we were brought more immediately in contact with.

Indeed, we had not time even to settle down on board and know each other properly; for each day added to our company, increasing the number of strange faces around us, so that I began to wonder when we would at length get our requisite complement and finish our apparently endless task of fitting out.

“It is a long lane that has no turning,” though, as the old adage goes; and so, after three weeks more of enrolling volunteers at Corporal Macan’s favourite “rendywoo,” and the hoisting in of many guns and boats and stores and provisions of all sorts, until theCandahar, I thought, would never contain them all, we finally bent our sails, crossed royal yards and were declared “ready for sea.”

Captain Farmer came on board with “all his bag and baggage” on our ship’s company “turning over” from the old hulkBlake, to which we all bade a long and welcome adieu, all hands being then mustered by divisions to beat of drum along the upper and lower decks.

We were eight hundred strong, all told; officers and men; bluejackets of all ratings, and marines; boys and “idlers,” as some of the hardest-worked fellows aboard are somewhat inappropriately designated in the watch bill, according to nautical etiquette; as motley a collection at the first start, and yet as fine a set of fellows as you could pick out in a year’s cruise!

These preliminaries being all arranged, we cast off from the hulk late one November afternoon; and, the dockyard tugPuffing Billytaking us in tow, proceeded to Spithead, where we anchored in eleven fathoms, letting out some six shackles of cable, so that we could swing comfortably with the tide as it flowed in and out of the roadstead.

Chapter Eight.A little Surprise.“I suppose,” said I, after we had cast anchor, to Larkyns, who had kindly noticed me the first day I came aboard and had been very friendly with me since, patronising me in the way the elder boys of the sixth form sometimes do the younger fellows at school, “we’ll sail to-morrow, eh?”“Sail to-morrow? Your grandmother!” he answered with his usual grin. I believe that chap would have grinned if you had told him his father was dead, for he looked on everything from a humorous point of view and could not help laughing even when the captain spoke to him, which often got him in for an extra mast-heading. “Why, we haven’t got in our lower deck guns yet, booby, let alone our powder and ammunition; besides all sorts of stores we could not ship in harbour!”“Oh!” I exclaimed, somewhat crestfallen at his “snub,” “I didn’t think of that.”“I suppose not,” replied he, mimicking me, “but you have a good deal to learn yet, let me tell you. Hullo, though, Master Squaretoes, what do you mean by coming on the quarter-deck with nails in your boots? You’ll have the first lieutenant after you, my joker, if he notices it, and there’ll be the dickens to pay, I can tell you!”“What do you mean?” I retorted indignantly. “I have not got any nails in my boots at all.”“Haven’t you, young shaver?” said he, grinning again and looking down with mock pity at the pumps I wore, which were guiltless of even the smallest tack, being all sewn, as I held up the soles for his inspection. “Then, all I can say is I’m sorry for you! I really didn’t think you were deformed—and such a young and promising chap, too!”I got alarmed at this.“Deformed!” I repeated. “What do you mean?”“Why, if you haven’t any nails in your boots, or shoes—it doesn’t matter which, but we’ll say boots for argument’s sake,” said my tormentor quizzingly—“it follows, naturally and logically, that you have none on your toes! In which case, my poor young friend, you must be suffering from a malformation of the feet; or, in other words, you are deformed, according to Euclid,quid demonstrandum est, twiggy vous?”“Oh, yes, I see,” said I, feeling rather nettled, I confess, at his thus taking a rise out of me. “You think that funny, I suppose; but, I call it both silly and vulgar!”“‘Silly!’ ‘vulgar!’ You very small fragment of impudence,” rejoined Larkyns, highly delighted at being thus successful in “pulling my leg” and making me angry, “I’ll have you keel-hauled for speaking so disrespectfully to your superior officer, sir. Beg my pardon instantly, or—”What he would have done, however, in case of my non-compliance with his imperative request remains a mystery to the present day; for, as at that moment, the commander, who had been surveying the maintop from the poop-rail above us, hearing my funny gentleman’s voice, which he had raised in speaking to me, called out to him—“Below there,” he cried—“Mr Larkyns!”“Yes, sir,” answered my “superior officer” humbly enough, touching his cap and looking up at Commander Nesbitt. “Want me, sir?”“Yes,” said the other, “There’s something wrong with the bunt of that tops’l, I think. It does not appear to me quite ship-shape somehow or other, Mr Larkyns. Go up to the maintop and see what’s the matter with it at once.”“Ay, ay, sir,” replied my tormentor, springing nimbly into the rigging and shinning up the ratlines almost as soon as the words were out of the commander’s mouth, “I’ll see, sir.”I looked up at the moment, and, catching Commander Nesbitt’s eye I’m sure he gave a sort of sly wink, the which impressed on my mind the conviction that he must have overheard our conversation and, wishing to give Master Larkyns some employment for his spare time, had sent him aloft on a wild-goose chase.The topsail was stowed snugly enough, so, my friend the middy’s missive was set-off to his chaff at my expense.This conviction was confirmed when the commander immediately afterwards ordered me to go forwards and tell the boatswain to get the fish tackle clear for hoisting in the lower deck guns as soon as they came alongside next morning in the dockyard lighters.The oldCandahar, you must know, although she was described in the “Navy List” of that day as a “two-decker,” had really four decks—the upper deck, main deck, lower deck and orlop deck.The distinction of the designation lay in the fact that she carried guns on two decks besides her upper one, the armament of which, as well as that of her main deck had been got on board easily enough when she was in harbour; but, as she was then lashed alongside the hulk and the lower tier of guns had to be taken in through the ports, this operation could not be very well managed until her broadside was clear of the hull of the other ship, so that the cannon could be lifted out of the lighters and swung inboard, without any intervening obstacle blocking the way and possibly fouling the hoisting tackle and steadying gear, which was not the case until we reached Spithead.Even then, it was no trifling task swaying the heavy guns out of the holds of the two lighters that brought them out to us early in the morning from the gun-wharf, one of these craft coming under our mainyard on either side; for, the guns were long thirty-two pounders, weighing fifty-six hundredweight, or nearly three tons apiece, and, even after they were hoisted up in mid air from the lighters they had then to be hauled through one of the midship ports, mounted on their carriages and run along the lower deck to their proper position, when the breechings and side tackle had to be fitted before the job was completed.It was accomplished in good time, however, much to our commander’s satisfaction; and, by the aid of the fish davit with its tackle and another purchase, it did not take more than a couple of hours to ship the whole thirty of these guns that comprised our lower deck armament.What formidable weapons I thought them! But, they were only babies to the big rifled breechloaders now in vogue; albeit they did tidy enough work in the destructive line in their day, as the annals of our navy can tell, and other nations have experienced to their cost both on land and sea!“Pretty little barkers, ain’t they?” observed Mr Triggs, the gunner, noticing me looking at these “long thirty-twos,” as they were styled, and wondering at the light and airy fashion in which the men handled them, tossing them about like shuttlecocks, so it seemed to me. “They can do more than bark; though, they can bite too, I tell ye!”“Oh, yes, I quite believe that, Mr Triggs,” said I, taking advantage of the opportunity of giving a “snop” to Larkyns, who was also standing by and, of course, grinning as usual. “Not all smoke and noise, like some fellows’ talk.”“No, that they ain’t, except, in course, when saluting,” replied the gunner, who was a plain matter-of-fact man and did not see the drift of my observation. “But, with a ten-pound charge, now, they’d make a pretty fair hole in a six-inch plank, I tell ye.”“How many of them, Mr Triggs,” I asked, “have we got on board?”“Of these long ’uns?” he said, patting one affectionately on the breech as he spoke. “Well, we’ve jist fifteen here a-port and fifteen a-starboard, which makes thirty in all on this deck. A power o’ metal, I tell ye!”“Oh, I know that,” said I. “But I mean how many of the same sort.”“There ain’t any more of the same sort, I tell ye, but what you sees,” rejoined the gunner a bit crossly. “The guns as is on the main deck and upper deck are all short thirty-two’s; and, they’re thirty too, o’ them on the main, and twenty-two on the upper deck. They all of ’em carries the same weight of shot, though not such heavy guns as these, being only forty-five hundredweight each.”“There, young Vernon, you can put that in your pipe and smoke it!” chimed in Larkyns, at this juncture, making a face behind the gunner’s back, which, had he seen it, might have altered the opinion that worthy presently expressed of the speaker. “That’s ‘the long and the short of it,’ as Mr Triggs has so eloquently explained!”“Thank you, Mr Larkyns, for the compliment,” said the gunner, taking the remark as a tribute to his conversational ability. “I allers tries to explain myself as well as I can. Is there anything more you’d like to know, Master Vernon? I’m allers pleased to instruct any of you young gentlemen when you asks civilly!”“You spoke just now of a ten-pound charge,” I answered. “I suppose you mean of powder without the shot?”“That’s notcharged,” put in Larkyns, grinning. “The shot is given in ‘free, gratis, for nothing,’ as Paddy said.”“Yes, Master Vernon,” replied the gunner, taking no notice this time of Larkyns or his interpolation. “These here guns take a full charge of ten pounds of powder for long range, and redooced charges of six and eight pounds; whilst the charges of them on the main and upper deck are either six or eight pounds, as the case might be, according to the service required.”“It must take an awful lot of powder for all the eighty-four guns, besides the shot and shell!”“You can bet on that,” replied Mr Triggs, moving towards the side and looking through the port in the direction of the harbour. “We carries about a hundred rounds of each charge for every gun; or, something like ninety tons for our whole armament. That’s what it takes.”“Ninety tons of gunpowder!” I exclaimed in astonishment. “Do you mean that we’ve got to take such a quantity as that on board?”“Of course I do; I always says what I means and means what I says,” rejoined Mr Triggs, somewhat snappishly again, as if tired of the long string of puzzling questions with which I was now bothering him, like I used to do my dear old Dad. “By Jingo! I’m blessed if there it ain’t a-coming off now, I tell ye!”“Coming off,” I repeated. “Where?”“There, booby,” said Larkyns, slewing me round and shoving my head right out of the port.“Can’t you see the powder hoy, there to your right, passing Blockhouse Fort, at the mouth of the harbour?”“That one flying the red flag, eh?”“Yes, my dear Squaretoes; but we don’t call a burgee a flag aboard ships.”“I wish you would not call me Squaretoes, Larkyns,” said I, peevishly, for he hurt me, squeezing my neck in his tight grip, holding me out of the port as if I were a kitten, so that I could not turn my head round. “I hate nicknames. Do leave me alone, please!”“Ah, would you, now!” he exclaimed in reply, as I tried to wrench myself free. “Don’t cry, my little pet, you haven’t got your mammy here to mollycoddle you!”“Let me go, Larkyns, you’re choking me,” I gasped out, wriggling violently and kicking out behind. “I’ll hurt you if you don’t loose me; I will, indeed!”He wouldn’t release me yet, however, seeing I was out of temper; and, some of the other middies not on duty gathering round, it being their watch below, egged Larkyns on, suggesting that as I seemed to think myself such a “big gun,” I ought to be sponged and loaded and run out.This humorous advice was immediately acted upon, a couple of the gang laying hold of my legs in spite of my kicks, while another assisted Larkyns, my tormenter; and the mischievous lot swung me backwards and forwards in and out of the port, until nearly all my clothes were pulled off my back and I hadn’t a sound button left to my jacket.I felt hot all over; and was in a fine rage, “I tell you,” as the gunner used to say.Mr Triggs, meanwhile, had gone up the hatchway to see about getting on board his ammunition, the vermilion-painted powder hoys I had observed in the distance at the mouth of the harbour being now nearly alongside the ship; and, all of a sudden, as my reckless shipmates were pulling me almost to pieces between them in their mad prank, there came a cry from the deck above, “Stand clear, below there!”At the same instant, a coil of rope whizzed by the port-hole out of which my body projected, the bight of it narrowly escaping my head in its downward descent, wetting my face with the spray it threw up as it splashed into the water right under me.I could not restrain a shriek of alarm; and, wriggling more violently than before in the hands of those holding me as I tried to release myself, I managed somehow or other to jerk away from their grasp, sending them all sprawling backward on the deck inboard, while I shot out of the port like a catapult, tumbling headlong into the sea as if taking a header after the rope!

“I suppose,” said I, after we had cast anchor, to Larkyns, who had kindly noticed me the first day I came aboard and had been very friendly with me since, patronising me in the way the elder boys of the sixth form sometimes do the younger fellows at school, “we’ll sail to-morrow, eh?”

“Sail to-morrow? Your grandmother!” he answered with his usual grin. I believe that chap would have grinned if you had told him his father was dead, for he looked on everything from a humorous point of view and could not help laughing even when the captain spoke to him, which often got him in for an extra mast-heading. “Why, we haven’t got in our lower deck guns yet, booby, let alone our powder and ammunition; besides all sorts of stores we could not ship in harbour!”

“Oh!” I exclaimed, somewhat crestfallen at his “snub,” “I didn’t think of that.”

“I suppose not,” replied he, mimicking me, “but you have a good deal to learn yet, let me tell you. Hullo, though, Master Squaretoes, what do you mean by coming on the quarter-deck with nails in your boots? You’ll have the first lieutenant after you, my joker, if he notices it, and there’ll be the dickens to pay, I can tell you!”

“What do you mean?” I retorted indignantly. “I have not got any nails in my boots at all.”

“Haven’t you, young shaver?” said he, grinning again and looking down with mock pity at the pumps I wore, which were guiltless of even the smallest tack, being all sewn, as I held up the soles for his inspection. “Then, all I can say is I’m sorry for you! I really didn’t think you were deformed—and such a young and promising chap, too!”

I got alarmed at this.

“Deformed!” I repeated. “What do you mean?”

“Why, if you haven’t any nails in your boots, or shoes—it doesn’t matter which, but we’ll say boots for argument’s sake,” said my tormentor quizzingly—“it follows, naturally and logically, that you have none on your toes! In which case, my poor young friend, you must be suffering from a malformation of the feet; or, in other words, you are deformed, according to Euclid,quid demonstrandum est, twiggy vous?”

“Oh, yes, I see,” said I, feeling rather nettled, I confess, at his thus taking a rise out of me. “You think that funny, I suppose; but, I call it both silly and vulgar!”

“‘Silly!’ ‘vulgar!’ You very small fragment of impudence,” rejoined Larkyns, highly delighted at being thus successful in “pulling my leg” and making me angry, “I’ll have you keel-hauled for speaking so disrespectfully to your superior officer, sir. Beg my pardon instantly, or—”

What he would have done, however, in case of my non-compliance with his imperative request remains a mystery to the present day; for, as at that moment, the commander, who had been surveying the maintop from the poop-rail above us, hearing my funny gentleman’s voice, which he had raised in speaking to me, called out to him—

“Below there,” he cried—“Mr Larkyns!”

“Yes, sir,” answered my “superior officer” humbly enough, touching his cap and looking up at Commander Nesbitt. “Want me, sir?”

“Yes,” said the other, “There’s something wrong with the bunt of that tops’l, I think. It does not appear to me quite ship-shape somehow or other, Mr Larkyns. Go up to the maintop and see what’s the matter with it at once.”

“Ay, ay, sir,” replied my tormentor, springing nimbly into the rigging and shinning up the ratlines almost as soon as the words were out of the commander’s mouth, “I’ll see, sir.”

I looked up at the moment, and, catching Commander Nesbitt’s eye I’m sure he gave a sort of sly wink, the which impressed on my mind the conviction that he must have overheard our conversation and, wishing to give Master Larkyns some employment for his spare time, had sent him aloft on a wild-goose chase.

The topsail was stowed snugly enough, so, my friend the middy’s missive was set-off to his chaff at my expense.

This conviction was confirmed when the commander immediately afterwards ordered me to go forwards and tell the boatswain to get the fish tackle clear for hoisting in the lower deck guns as soon as they came alongside next morning in the dockyard lighters.

The oldCandahar, you must know, although she was described in the “Navy List” of that day as a “two-decker,” had really four decks—the upper deck, main deck, lower deck and orlop deck.

The distinction of the designation lay in the fact that she carried guns on two decks besides her upper one, the armament of which, as well as that of her main deck had been got on board easily enough when she was in harbour; but, as she was then lashed alongside the hulk and the lower tier of guns had to be taken in through the ports, this operation could not be very well managed until her broadside was clear of the hull of the other ship, so that the cannon could be lifted out of the lighters and swung inboard, without any intervening obstacle blocking the way and possibly fouling the hoisting tackle and steadying gear, which was not the case until we reached Spithead.

Even then, it was no trifling task swaying the heavy guns out of the holds of the two lighters that brought them out to us early in the morning from the gun-wharf, one of these craft coming under our mainyard on either side; for, the guns were long thirty-two pounders, weighing fifty-six hundredweight, or nearly three tons apiece, and, even after they were hoisted up in mid air from the lighters they had then to be hauled through one of the midship ports, mounted on their carriages and run along the lower deck to their proper position, when the breechings and side tackle had to be fitted before the job was completed.

It was accomplished in good time, however, much to our commander’s satisfaction; and, by the aid of the fish davit with its tackle and another purchase, it did not take more than a couple of hours to ship the whole thirty of these guns that comprised our lower deck armament.

What formidable weapons I thought them! But, they were only babies to the big rifled breechloaders now in vogue; albeit they did tidy enough work in the destructive line in their day, as the annals of our navy can tell, and other nations have experienced to their cost both on land and sea!

“Pretty little barkers, ain’t they?” observed Mr Triggs, the gunner, noticing me looking at these “long thirty-twos,” as they were styled, and wondering at the light and airy fashion in which the men handled them, tossing them about like shuttlecocks, so it seemed to me. “They can do more than bark; though, they can bite too, I tell ye!”

“Oh, yes, I quite believe that, Mr Triggs,” said I, taking advantage of the opportunity of giving a “snop” to Larkyns, who was also standing by and, of course, grinning as usual. “Not all smoke and noise, like some fellows’ talk.”

“No, that they ain’t, except, in course, when saluting,” replied the gunner, who was a plain matter-of-fact man and did not see the drift of my observation. “But, with a ten-pound charge, now, they’d make a pretty fair hole in a six-inch plank, I tell ye.”

“How many of them, Mr Triggs,” I asked, “have we got on board?”

“Of these long ’uns?” he said, patting one affectionately on the breech as he spoke. “Well, we’ve jist fifteen here a-port and fifteen a-starboard, which makes thirty in all on this deck. A power o’ metal, I tell ye!”

“Oh, I know that,” said I. “But I mean how many of the same sort.”

“There ain’t any more of the same sort, I tell ye, but what you sees,” rejoined the gunner a bit crossly. “The guns as is on the main deck and upper deck are all short thirty-two’s; and, they’re thirty too, o’ them on the main, and twenty-two on the upper deck. They all of ’em carries the same weight of shot, though not such heavy guns as these, being only forty-five hundredweight each.”

“There, young Vernon, you can put that in your pipe and smoke it!” chimed in Larkyns, at this juncture, making a face behind the gunner’s back, which, had he seen it, might have altered the opinion that worthy presently expressed of the speaker. “That’s ‘the long and the short of it,’ as Mr Triggs has so eloquently explained!”

“Thank you, Mr Larkyns, for the compliment,” said the gunner, taking the remark as a tribute to his conversational ability. “I allers tries to explain myself as well as I can. Is there anything more you’d like to know, Master Vernon? I’m allers pleased to instruct any of you young gentlemen when you asks civilly!”

“You spoke just now of a ten-pound charge,” I answered. “I suppose you mean of powder without the shot?”

“That’s notcharged,” put in Larkyns, grinning. “The shot is given in ‘free, gratis, for nothing,’ as Paddy said.”

“Yes, Master Vernon,” replied the gunner, taking no notice this time of Larkyns or his interpolation. “These here guns take a full charge of ten pounds of powder for long range, and redooced charges of six and eight pounds; whilst the charges of them on the main and upper deck are either six or eight pounds, as the case might be, according to the service required.”

“It must take an awful lot of powder for all the eighty-four guns, besides the shot and shell!”

“You can bet on that,” replied Mr Triggs, moving towards the side and looking through the port in the direction of the harbour. “We carries about a hundred rounds of each charge for every gun; or, something like ninety tons for our whole armament. That’s what it takes.”

“Ninety tons of gunpowder!” I exclaimed in astonishment. “Do you mean that we’ve got to take such a quantity as that on board?”

“Of course I do; I always says what I means and means what I says,” rejoined Mr Triggs, somewhat snappishly again, as if tired of the long string of puzzling questions with which I was now bothering him, like I used to do my dear old Dad. “By Jingo! I’m blessed if there it ain’t a-coming off now, I tell ye!”

“Coming off,” I repeated. “Where?”

“There, booby,” said Larkyns, slewing me round and shoving my head right out of the port.

“Can’t you see the powder hoy, there to your right, passing Blockhouse Fort, at the mouth of the harbour?”

“That one flying the red flag, eh?”

“Yes, my dear Squaretoes; but we don’t call a burgee a flag aboard ships.”

“I wish you would not call me Squaretoes, Larkyns,” said I, peevishly, for he hurt me, squeezing my neck in his tight grip, holding me out of the port as if I were a kitten, so that I could not turn my head round. “I hate nicknames. Do leave me alone, please!”

“Ah, would you, now!” he exclaimed in reply, as I tried to wrench myself free. “Don’t cry, my little pet, you haven’t got your mammy here to mollycoddle you!”

“Let me go, Larkyns, you’re choking me,” I gasped out, wriggling violently and kicking out behind. “I’ll hurt you if you don’t loose me; I will, indeed!”

He wouldn’t release me yet, however, seeing I was out of temper; and, some of the other middies not on duty gathering round, it being their watch below, egged Larkyns on, suggesting that as I seemed to think myself such a “big gun,” I ought to be sponged and loaded and run out.

This humorous advice was immediately acted upon, a couple of the gang laying hold of my legs in spite of my kicks, while another assisted Larkyns, my tormenter; and the mischievous lot swung me backwards and forwards in and out of the port, until nearly all my clothes were pulled off my back and I hadn’t a sound button left to my jacket.

I felt hot all over; and was in a fine rage, “I tell you,” as the gunner used to say.

Mr Triggs, meanwhile, had gone up the hatchway to see about getting on board his ammunition, the vermilion-painted powder hoys I had observed in the distance at the mouth of the harbour being now nearly alongside the ship; and, all of a sudden, as my reckless shipmates were pulling me almost to pieces between them in their mad prank, there came a cry from the deck above, “Stand clear, below there!”

At the same instant, a coil of rope whizzed by the port-hole out of which my body projected, the bight of it narrowly escaping my head in its downward descent, wetting my face with the spray it threw up as it splashed into the water right under me.

I could not restrain a shriek of alarm; and, wriggling more violently than before in the hands of those holding me as I tried to release myself, I managed somehow or other to jerk away from their grasp, sending them all sprawling backward on the deck inboard, while I shot out of the port like a catapult, tumbling headlong into the sea as if taking a header after the rope!

Chapter Nine.My Dip gains me a Dinner.Fortunately, though, as I fell, my outstretched hands, clutching wildly in the air, came in contact with the identical rope whose sudden descent from the gangway above had been the unwitting cause of the disaster, the tail end of the “whip” Mr Triggs had ordered to be rigged up from the lee yardarm, in readiness to hoist in the powder when the hoy bringing the same was made fast alongside.This naturally yielded to my weight as I clung to it, on account of the other end, which passed through a block fastened to the yard, not being secured.However, it let me down easy into the water, my unexpected immersion making no noise to speak of and hardly causing a ripple on the surface of the tide as it gurgled past the ship’s counter and eddied away in ripples under her stem.Not a soul on board, indeed, knew of my mishap save those merry messmates of mine, all of whom doubtless, I thought, as soon as I regained my composure after the fright and knew that I was comparatively safe, would be in a great funk, fearing the worst had happened.Glancing upward, my head being just clear of the water, which I trod to keep myself in an erect position, holding on, though, all the while, “like grim death,” to the rope, of which I had taken a turn round my wrist, I saw Larkyns, the ringleader of the frolic, leaning out over the port sill as pale as a ghost.He was looking downwards, in every direction but the right one, seeking vainly to discover me; and he evidently dreaded that I was drowned, his face being the picture of misery and despair.“Hist, old chap, don’t call out,” I whispered in a low voice, as he was about to give up the search and rouse the ship. “I’m all right, my boy.”“My goodness Vernon, is that you? I thought you were lost, old chap,” he hailed back in the same key, the expression of his face changing instantly to one of heartfelt relief. “Thank God you’re not drowned! But, where are you, old fellow; I can’t see you?”“Right under your very nose, you blind old mole! I am bent on to a bight of the whip falls,” I answered, with a chuckle. “Keep the other end of the rope taut, old chap, and I’ll be able to climb up back into the port without anybody being the wiser but ourselves, my hearty, and so we’ll all escape going into the report.”He grasped the situation in an instant; and, likewise, saw the advisability of keeping the matter quiet now that I was not in any imminent peril.Master Larkyns knew as well as myself that if the tragic result of their skylarking should get wind and reach the ears of Captain Farmer, he and his brother mids would have a rough time of it, and probably all be had up on the quarter-deck.“All serene, Vernon, I under-constubble,” he softly whispered back to me, in our gunroom slang. “Do you think you can manage to climb up by yourself, or shall I come down and help you?”“Fiddlesticks, you duffer! I can get up right enough onmy owncheek,” I said with a titter, though my mouth was full of the brackish water into which I had plunged at first head and ears over, while my teeth were chattering with cold, the frosty November air being chilly. “I shall fancy I’m climbing the greasy pole at a regatta and that you’re the pig on the top, old fellow. How’s that, umpire, for your ‘Squaretoes,’ eh?”“Ah, pax! You’re a trump, Jack Vernon, and I promise never to call you by that name any more as it annoys you,” he replied, chuckling at my joke, though it was at his own expense. He then leant out of the port further so as to get a tight grip of the whip fall, the other fellows holding on to him in turn to prevent his toppling over and joining me below, singing out as soon as their preparations were completed, calling out to me, “Are you ready?”“Ready?” I repeated, quoting my favourite Napierian motto again. “Ay ready!”“Then, up you come, my joker! Put your feet in the bight and hold on to the slack of the rope above your head and we’ll hoist you up in regular man-of-war fashion. Now, my lads, pull baker, pull devil!”He spoke under his breath; and yet, I heard every word he said, not only to me, but to the others inboard, grouped behind him within the port.Quick as lightning I followed out his directions, clinging to the lower end of the rope like an eel; and, as soon as I gave the word, Larkyns and the rest of the mids clapping on to the running part of the whip falls, which ran through the block above, hoisted me up in a twinkling, as if I were a sack of flour, to the level of the port sill.Once there, I was clutched by a dozen eager hands, and my whilom tormenters dragged me in, all dripping, and landed me on the deck beside them—“very like a fish,” according to the old adage; and bearing just then the most unmistakable evidence of having come “out of water!”After thus “landing me,” the ends of the whip tackle were dropped again over the side in the same stealthy manner in which my rescue was effected, and as promptly.My frolicsome friends were not an instant too soon; for, even while they were congratulating me all round, and declaring I was the best of good fellows for behaving so bravely and not “kicking up a row,” though I had gone overboard so suddenly, the big, broad-beamed powder hoy slewed up alongside and Mr Triggs bustled down the hatchway.Immediately after him came Mr Cheffinch, our gunnery lieutenant, accompanied by a strong working party to ensure the rapid transhipment of the combustible material and its storage in the magazines; and we could hear the boatswain piping all hands on the upper deck to man the whip falls of the hoists and lowering tackle.I at once rushed away to my chest in the steerage, to change my wet clothes, hoping to return as quickly as I could to see what was going on, without my plight being seen or anyone knowing what had happened to get me into such a drenched condition; but, unfortunately, Corporal Macan caught sight of me as I was struggling to open my chest, for my fingers were so numbed with the cold that the keys I held in my hand jingled like castanets.“Begorrah an’ it’s a purty state ye’re in, sor,” he said, eyeing me with much commiseration. “Sure an’ ye’ve got the aguey.”“Nonsense, Macan,” I answered shortly, wishing to shut him up at once, for he was Dr Nettleby’s factotum and if he got hold of the story it would soon be all over the ship. “I’ve only been splashed with some water and want to shift my rig, that’s all.”“Sphlashed is it, sor?” he repeated with a broad grin that completely shut out the rest of his face. “Faith, if ye was to axe me I’d tell ye, begorrah, ye looks loike a drowned rat, sor!”“None of your impudence, corporal,” I said with dignity, not liking his easy familiarity; though, poor fellow, he did not mean any harm by it, as it was only his Irish way of speaking; “I’ll report you to the sergeant.”“An’ is it rayportingme, sor, you’d be afther, an’ you thremblin’ all over,” he rejoined, catching hold of me and helping to peel off my soaking garments. “Faith, sor, I’ll be afther rayportin’youto the docthor!”“Hi, hullo, who’s taking my name in vain?” at that moment exclaimed Dr Nettleby himself, emerging from the gunroom at this critical juncture, the worthy medico having been making his rounds, looking up some of those of his patients who were not actually on the sick list. “I’m sure I heard that Irish blackguard Macan’s voice somewhere. Ah, it is you, corporal, as I thought! Hi, hullo, what’s the matter, youngster?”“I—I’m all right, sir,” said I, trying to rise, but sinking back again on the lid of my chest, where I had been sitting down while the good-natured marine was endeavouring to pull off my wet boots. “It is nothing, sir.”“He’s bin taking a dip in the say, sir, wid all his clothes on,” explained Macan; “an’ faith he’s got a bit damp, sir.”“Damp, you call it, corporal? Why, he’s dripping wet and chilled to the bone!” cried the doctor, feeling my pulse. “How did this come about, youngster?”“It was an accident, sir,” I replied hesitatingly, not wishing to incriminate my messmates. “I would rather not speak of it, doctor, if you’ll excuse me.”“Oh, I see, skylarking, eh? Well, well, you must go to bed at once, or you’ll be in a high fever before sundown. Corporal Macan!”“Yis, sor.”“Take this young gentleman to the sick bay and put him into a clean cot with plenty of blankets round him. By the way, too, corporal, ask Dr McGilpin to let you have a stiff glass of hot grog.”“For mesilf, sor?”“No, you rascal, confound your cheek! Certainly not,” replied the doctor, amused by the question. “This young gentleman is to take it as hot as he can drink it. It will throw him into a perspiration and make him sleep. Do you hear, youngster?”“Y–es, sir,” I stammered out as well as I could, for my teeth were chattering again and I was shaking all over. “Bu–but I’d rather not go to the sick bay, sir, if you don’t mind. I don’t want anyone to hear of wha—what has hap-hap-happened.”“Ah, yes, I see,” said Dr Nettleby. “You’re afraid of some of your nice messmates getting hauled over the coals? I bet that madcap Larkyns is at the bottom of it; I saw him with you close to one of the ports just now, as I passed by on my way down here, and I wondered what mischief you were up to! Well, well, I respect you, my boy, for not telling tales out of school, as the old saying goes; so, I won’t split on you. Carry the youngster to my cabin, Macan, and then nobody will know anything about the matter. See here, I will look after you myself, youngster and keep you a prisoner till you’re all right again. What d’you think of that, now?”“Th-a-nk you, doctor,” said I, faintly, for I felt very weak and giddy, everything seeming to be whirling round me. “I’ll—”“Yes, yes, I know; all right, my boy, all right,” interrupted the kind-hearted, old fellow, stopping any further attempt to speak on my part; and the brawny corporal of marines at the same instant lifting me up in his arms as if I were a baby, I lost consciousness, the last thing I recollect hearing being the doctor’s voice, sounding, though, far away as if a mile off, like a voice in a dream, saying to me in the soft, purring tone he always adopted when in a specially good temper, “Here, drink this, my boy, and go to sleep!”“Faith an’ sure ye’re awake at last!” exclaimed Corporal Macan when I opened my eyes, a minute or so after this, as I thought. “How d’ye fale now, sor?”“Hullo!” said I, raising my head and looking round me in astonishment. “Where am I?”“In Dr Nittleby’s own cabin, sure,” answered the Irishman, grinning; “an’ by the same token, sor, as he wor called away by the cap’en, he lift me here for to say, he tould me, whither ye wor di’d or aloive, sure, whin ye woke up.”“I feel awfully hungry, Corporal Macan,” said I, after a pause to reflect on the situation. “Have I been asleep long?”“Ivver since Siven Bells, sure, in the forenoon watch, sor.”“And what’s the time now?”“Close on Four Bells in the first dog watch, sor.”“Good gracious me!” I exclaimed in consternation, tossing off a lot of blankets that lay on the top of me and jumping out of the big bunk that was like a sofa, where I had been sleeping, on to the deck of the cabin; when I found I was attired only in a long garment, which must have been one of the doctor’s nightshirts, for it reached down considerably below my feet, tripping me up on my trying to walk towards the door. “Where are my clothes?”“Here, sor,” replied the corporal, equal to the occasion, taking up a bundle that was lying on one of the lockers and proceeding to spread out my uniform, jacket and trousers and other articles of wearing apparel seriatim, on the top of the bed-place; Macan smoothing down each with the palm of his hand as if he were grooming a horse. “I had ’em dried at the galley foire, sor, whilst ye wor a-slapin’.”“Thank you, corporal,” I said, dressing as quickly as I could with his assistance; the marine, like most of his class, being a handy, useful fellow and not a bad valet on a pinch. “I must hurry up. I wonder if I can get any dinner in the gunroom.”“Faith ye’re too late for that, sor,” answered Macan with much concern. “An’ for tay, too, sor, as will. It’s all cleared away this hour an’ more.”“Oh, dear, what shall I do?” I ejaculated as I dragged on my boots, which had not been improved by their dip in the sea and subsequent roasting on top of a hot iron stove, although I noticed they had been nicely polished by the corporal. “I feel hungry enough to ‘eat a horse and chase the rider,’ as I heard a fellow say the other day!”“Ye must fale betther, sor, if you’re hoongry,” observed Macan on my completing my toilet and donning my cap again. “That’s a raal good sign whin ye’re inclined fur to ate—at laste that’s what the docther sez.”“Providing you’ve got something to eat!” I rejoined ruefully, for I knew there wouldn’t be much left if the gunroom fellows had cleared out. “What did Doctor Nettleby say was the matter with me, eh?”“He s’id ye wor a comet, sor.”“A comet?” I repeated, laughing. “You’re making a mistake, corporal.”“The divil a ha’porth, sor. He called ye that same.”“Nonsense, man!” I said. “The doctor made use of some medical term, probably, which you don’t understand.”“Mebbe, sor, for I’m no scholard, worse luck!” replied the corporal, unconvinced. “The docther do sometime bring out one of them outlandish wurrds that nayther the divvil nor Father Murphy, more power to him! could make out at all at all; but, whin ye dhropped down this afthernoon on the dick alongside o’ yer chist, an’ I picked ye up, he says, sez he, ye was ayther a ‘comet,’ or in a ‘comet house,’ or somethin’ loike that, I’ll take me oath wid me dyin’ breath, though what the divvil he manes, I’m sure I can’t say, sor!”“Oh, I see now!” I exclaimed, a light suddenly flashing on me as to his meaning. “I must have fainted away and the doctor told you I was in a comatose state, eh?”“An’ isn’t that, sure, a comet, sor, as I tould ye!” cried the Irishman, triumphantly. “Hullo, here’s Peters, the cap’en’s stooard dodgin’ about the gangway. I wondther what he’s afther?”I walked out of the cabin as he spoke, and the man he referred to came up to me at once.“Beg pardon, sir,” said he, civilly, touching his forelock in salute. “Mr Vernon, sir, I believe?”“Yes,” I replied, rather anxious to learn what was wanted of me, “that is my name.”“Cap’en Farmer presents his compliments, sir, and requests the pleasure of your company to dinner this evening.”“Give my compliments to the captain, and say that I shall be most happy to accept his kind invitation,” I answered, putting on my most dignified manner, as if it was quite an everyday occurrence for me to be asked to dinner by officers of the highest rank; though, I felt inclined to jump with joy at the prospect, especially under the circumstances of my famished condition. “What time do you serve up dinner, steward?”“We allers dines at Four Bells, sir,” said he, with equal dignity, conscious of his position apparently as captain’s steward, and at the same time not oblivious of the fact that I was only a naval cadet. “In ten minutes time, sir, dinner will be on the table.”“All right, my man, I’ll be there,” I replied in an off-hand way, as he went on towards the wardroom, opposite to where we were standing; and I added aside to the corporal, “I don’t think there’s any fear of my being late!”“Faith, the divil doubt ye, sor,” said Macan in reply to this, breaking into a broad grin as he set to work methodically to put the doctor’s cabin straight again, while I turned to go below to my proper quarters, with the intention of making myself smart for the forthcoming feast. “Musha, I wudn’t loike to be the dish foreninst ye, sor, if ye can ate a hoss, as ye s’id jist now!”A few minutes later, attired in my best uniform, I was ushered by the marine sentry, who stood without the doorway, into the big after-cabin beneath the poop that served for Captain Farmer’s reception-room.This was a handsome apartment, hung round with pictures and decorated with choice hothouse flowers and evergreens, as unlike as possible anything one might expect to find on board ship.The very gun-carriages on either side were concealed by drapery, as well as the windows at the further end which opened on to the stern gallery, that projected, like a balcony, over the shimmering sea beneath, whereon the lights from the ports played and danced on the rippling tide in a hundred broken reflections, the evening having closed in and it now being quite dark around.I was received very kindly by Captain Farmer.He was a short and rather stout man, so he looked uncommonly funny in his mess jacket, which, according to the custom of the service, was cut in the Eton fashion and gave him a striking resemblance to an over-grown schoolboy, as I thought; but, I soon forgot his appearance, his manner was so charming, while his anxiety to set me at my ease seemed as great as if I had been an admiral at the least, instead of being only little Jack Vernon, naval cadet!The doctor was talking to him when I came in; and he spoke to me very cordially, too, feeling my pulse as he shook hands with me.“Ha! No fear of your kicking the bucket yet, my little friend,” he said in his dry way, as we all proceeded into the fore cabin, where dinner was laid, Captain Farmer leading the way as soon as his steward Peters intimated that everything was ready. “No cold or fever after your sudden chill, thanks to my prescription! But, I won’t answer for consumption after your long fast. I can see from your eye, youngster, you’ll have a bad attack of that presently, eh? Ho, ho, ho!”Of course I grinned at this; and, I may state at once, that, by the time the repast was concluded, I had fully justified the doctor’s sapient prediction, being blessed with the healthiest of appetites and a good digestion, which my temporary indisposition had in nowise impaired.Mr Cheffinch, our gunnery lieutenant, who was one of the other guests, sat beside me, and from a remark or two he made I discovered that not only did he know of my adventure, but that the captain was also cognisant with the circumstances of the case, although the facts had not been officially communicated to him and he was not supposed to be aware of what had happened.“He thinks you behaved very pluckily, youngster,” observed Mr Cheffinch in the most gracious way, when informing me of this. “Ay and so do we all in the wardroom, let me tell you!”“I’m sure I don’t know what I have done to deserve your praise, sir,” said I, feeling quite abashed by all these compliments. “It was all an accident.”“It is not so much what you did as what you didn’t do, youngster,” he replied, frankly enough. “You didn’t show any funk or make a fuss when you fell overboard, and you did not wish to get your messmates into a scrape when Dr Nettleby—he told us this himself in confidence—found out the state you were in and made inquiries. In so doing, you behaved like a true sailor and a gentleman, and we’re all proud to have such a promising brother officer amongst us, young Vernon, I assure you. If you go on as you have begun, you’ll be a credit to the service.”Such a flattering eulogium made me blush like a peony, and I was very glad when the captain presently proposed the toast of “The Queen,” which we drank, all standing.This being satisfactorily done, taking that hint from the doctor that I had “better turn in early and have a good night’s rest after all the exertions I had gone through,” as a sort of reminder that they had seen enough of me for the occasion, I paid my adieux to the captain and company and went on deck, where I remained while the watch was being called at Eight Bells.I need hardly add that, in this interval, I ruminated over the strange succession of events that had taken place within so short a period; events which, possibly, might make, as they just as probably might have marred, my entire future career in the service—ay, and, perhaps, have ended it altogether, but for God’s good providence!

Fortunately, though, as I fell, my outstretched hands, clutching wildly in the air, came in contact with the identical rope whose sudden descent from the gangway above had been the unwitting cause of the disaster, the tail end of the “whip” Mr Triggs had ordered to be rigged up from the lee yardarm, in readiness to hoist in the powder when the hoy bringing the same was made fast alongside.

This naturally yielded to my weight as I clung to it, on account of the other end, which passed through a block fastened to the yard, not being secured.

However, it let me down easy into the water, my unexpected immersion making no noise to speak of and hardly causing a ripple on the surface of the tide as it gurgled past the ship’s counter and eddied away in ripples under her stem.

Not a soul on board, indeed, knew of my mishap save those merry messmates of mine, all of whom doubtless, I thought, as soon as I regained my composure after the fright and knew that I was comparatively safe, would be in a great funk, fearing the worst had happened.

Glancing upward, my head being just clear of the water, which I trod to keep myself in an erect position, holding on, though, all the while, “like grim death,” to the rope, of which I had taken a turn round my wrist, I saw Larkyns, the ringleader of the frolic, leaning out over the port sill as pale as a ghost.

He was looking downwards, in every direction but the right one, seeking vainly to discover me; and he evidently dreaded that I was drowned, his face being the picture of misery and despair.

“Hist, old chap, don’t call out,” I whispered in a low voice, as he was about to give up the search and rouse the ship. “I’m all right, my boy.”

“My goodness Vernon, is that you? I thought you were lost, old chap,” he hailed back in the same key, the expression of his face changing instantly to one of heartfelt relief. “Thank God you’re not drowned! But, where are you, old fellow; I can’t see you?”

“Right under your very nose, you blind old mole! I am bent on to a bight of the whip falls,” I answered, with a chuckle. “Keep the other end of the rope taut, old chap, and I’ll be able to climb up back into the port without anybody being the wiser but ourselves, my hearty, and so we’ll all escape going into the report.”

He grasped the situation in an instant; and, likewise, saw the advisability of keeping the matter quiet now that I was not in any imminent peril.

Master Larkyns knew as well as myself that if the tragic result of their skylarking should get wind and reach the ears of Captain Farmer, he and his brother mids would have a rough time of it, and probably all be had up on the quarter-deck.

“All serene, Vernon, I under-constubble,” he softly whispered back to me, in our gunroom slang. “Do you think you can manage to climb up by yourself, or shall I come down and help you?”

“Fiddlesticks, you duffer! I can get up right enough onmy owncheek,” I said with a titter, though my mouth was full of the brackish water into which I had plunged at first head and ears over, while my teeth were chattering with cold, the frosty November air being chilly. “I shall fancy I’m climbing the greasy pole at a regatta and that you’re the pig on the top, old fellow. How’s that, umpire, for your ‘Squaretoes,’ eh?”

“Ah, pax! You’re a trump, Jack Vernon, and I promise never to call you by that name any more as it annoys you,” he replied, chuckling at my joke, though it was at his own expense. He then leant out of the port further so as to get a tight grip of the whip fall, the other fellows holding on to him in turn to prevent his toppling over and joining me below, singing out as soon as their preparations were completed, calling out to me, “Are you ready?”

“Ready?” I repeated, quoting my favourite Napierian motto again. “Ay ready!”

“Then, up you come, my joker! Put your feet in the bight and hold on to the slack of the rope above your head and we’ll hoist you up in regular man-of-war fashion. Now, my lads, pull baker, pull devil!”

He spoke under his breath; and yet, I heard every word he said, not only to me, but to the others inboard, grouped behind him within the port.

Quick as lightning I followed out his directions, clinging to the lower end of the rope like an eel; and, as soon as I gave the word, Larkyns and the rest of the mids clapping on to the running part of the whip falls, which ran through the block above, hoisted me up in a twinkling, as if I were a sack of flour, to the level of the port sill.

Once there, I was clutched by a dozen eager hands, and my whilom tormenters dragged me in, all dripping, and landed me on the deck beside them—“very like a fish,” according to the old adage; and bearing just then the most unmistakable evidence of having come “out of water!”

After thus “landing me,” the ends of the whip tackle were dropped again over the side in the same stealthy manner in which my rescue was effected, and as promptly.

My frolicsome friends were not an instant too soon; for, even while they were congratulating me all round, and declaring I was the best of good fellows for behaving so bravely and not “kicking up a row,” though I had gone overboard so suddenly, the big, broad-beamed powder hoy slewed up alongside and Mr Triggs bustled down the hatchway.

Immediately after him came Mr Cheffinch, our gunnery lieutenant, accompanied by a strong working party to ensure the rapid transhipment of the combustible material and its storage in the magazines; and we could hear the boatswain piping all hands on the upper deck to man the whip falls of the hoists and lowering tackle.

I at once rushed away to my chest in the steerage, to change my wet clothes, hoping to return as quickly as I could to see what was going on, without my plight being seen or anyone knowing what had happened to get me into such a drenched condition; but, unfortunately, Corporal Macan caught sight of me as I was struggling to open my chest, for my fingers were so numbed with the cold that the keys I held in my hand jingled like castanets.

“Begorrah an’ it’s a purty state ye’re in, sor,” he said, eyeing me with much commiseration. “Sure an’ ye’ve got the aguey.”

“Nonsense, Macan,” I answered shortly, wishing to shut him up at once, for he was Dr Nettleby’s factotum and if he got hold of the story it would soon be all over the ship. “I’ve only been splashed with some water and want to shift my rig, that’s all.”

“Sphlashed is it, sor?” he repeated with a broad grin that completely shut out the rest of his face. “Faith, if ye was to axe me I’d tell ye, begorrah, ye looks loike a drowned rat, sor!”

“None of your impudence, corporal,” I said with dignity, not liking his easy familiarity; though, poor fellow, he did not mean any harm by it, as it was only his Irish way of speaking; “I’ll report you to the sergeant.”

“An’ is it rayportingme, sor, you’d be afther, an’ you thremblin’ all over,” he rejoined, catching hold of me and helping to peel off my soaking garments. “Faith, sor, I’ll be afther rayportin’youto the docthor!”

“Hi, hullo, who’s taking my name in vain?” at that moment exclaimed Dr Nettleby himself, emerging from the gunroom at this critical juncture, the worthy medico having been making his rounds, looking up some of those of his patients who were not actually on the sick list. “I’m sure I heard that Irish blackguard Macan’s voice somewhere. Ah, it is you, corporal, as I thought! Hi, hullo, what’s the matter, youngster?”

“I—I’m all right, sir,” said I, trying to rise, but sinking back again on the lid of my chest, where I had been sitting down while the good-natured marine was endeavouring to pull off my wet boots. “It is nothing, sir.”

“He’s bin taking a dip in the say, sir, wid all his clothes on,” explained Macan; “an’ faith he’s got a bit damp, sir.”

“Damp, you call it, corporal? Why, he’s dripping wet and chilled to the bone!” cried the doctor, feeling my pulse. “How did this come about, youngster?”

“It was an accident, sir,” I replied hesitatingly, not wishing to incriminate my messmates. “I would rather not speak of it, doctor, if you’ll excuse me.”

“Oh, I see, skylarking, eh? Well, well, you must go to bed at once, or you’ll be in a high fever before sundown. Corporal Macan!”

“Yis, sor.”

“Take this young gentleman to the sick bay and put him into a clean cot with plenty of blankets round him. By the way, too, corporal, ask Dr McGilpin to let you have a stiff glass of hot grog.”

“For mesilf, sor?”

“No, you rascal, confound your cheek! Certainly not,” replied the doctor, amused by the question. “This young gentleman is to take it as hot as he can drink it. It will throw him into a perspiration and make him sleep. Do you hear, youngster?”

“Y–es, sir,” I stammered out as well as I could, for my teeth were chattering again and I was shaking all over. “Bu–but I’d rather not go to the sick bay, sir, if you don’t mind. I don’t want anyone to hear of wha—what has hap-hap-happened.”

“Ah, yes, I see,” said Dr Nettleby. “You’re afraid of some of your nice messmates getting hauled over the coals? I bet that madcap Larkyns is at the bottom of it; I saw him with you close to one of the ports just now, as I passed by on my way down here, and I wondered what mischief you were up to! Well, well, I respect you, my boy, for not telling tales out of school, as the old saying goes; so, I won’t split on you. Carry the youngster to my cabin, Macan, and then nobody will know anything about the matter. See here, I will look after you myself, youngster and keep you a prisoner till you’re all right again. What d’you think of that, now?”

“Th-a-nk you, doctor,” said I, faintly, for I felt very weak and giddy, everything seeming to be whirling round me. “I’ll—”

“Yes, yes, I know; all right, my boy, all right,” interrupted the kind-hearted, old fellow, stopping any further attempt to speak on my part; and the brawny corporal of marines at the same instant lifting me up in his arms as if I were a baby, I lost consciousness, the last thing I recollect hearing being the doctor’s voice, sounding, though, far away as if a mile off, like a voice in a dream, saying to me in the soft, purring tone he always adopted when in a specially good temper, “Here, drink this, my boy, and go to sleep!”

“Faith an’ sure ye’re awake at last!” exclaimed Corporal Macan when I opened my eyes, a minute or so after this, as I thought. “How d’ye fale now, sor?”

“Hullo!” said I, raising my head and looking round me in astonishment. “Where am I?”

“In Dr Nittleby’s own cabin, sure,” answered the Irishman, grinning; “an’ by the same token, sor, as he wor called away by the cap’en, he lift me here for to say, he tould me, whither ye wor di’d or aloive, sure, whin ye woke up.”

“I feel awfully hungry, Corporal Macan,” said I, after a pause to reflect on the situation. “Have I been asleep long?”

“Ivver since Siven Bells, sure, in the forenoon watch, sor.”

“And what’s the time now?”

“Close on Four Bells in the first dog watch, sor.”

“Good gracious me!” I exclaimed in consternation, tossing off a lot of blankets that lay on the top of me and jumping out of the big bunk that was like a sofa, where I had been sleeping, on to the deck of the cabin; when I found I was attired only in a long garment, which must have been one of the doctor’s nightshirts, for it reached down considerably below my feet, tripping me up on my trying to walk towards the door. “Where are my clothes?”

“Here, sor,” replied the corporal, equal to the occasion, taking up a bundle that was lying on one of the lockers and proceeding to spread out my uniform, jacket and trousers and other articles of wearing apparel seriatim, on the top of the bed-place; Macan smoothing down each with the palm of his hand as if he were grooming a horse. “I had ’em dried at the galley foire, sor, whilst ye wor a-slapin’.”

“Thank you, corporal,” I said, dressing as quickly as I could with his assistance; the marine, like most of his class, being a handy, useful fellow and not a bad valet on a pinch. “I must hurry up. I wonder if I can get any dinner in the gunroom.”

“Faith ye’re too late for that, sor,” answered Macan with much concern. “An’ for tay, too, sor, as will. It’s all cleared away this hour an’ more.”

“Oh, dear, what shall I do?” I ejaculated as I dragged on my boots, which had not been improved by their dip in the sea and subsequent roasting on top of a hot iron stove, although I noticed they had been nicely polished by the corporal. “I feel hungry enough to ‘eat a horse and chase the rider,’ as I heard a fellow say the other day!”

“Ye must fale betther, sor, if you’re hoongry,” observed Macan on my completing my toilet and donning my cap again. “That’s a raal good sign whin ye’re inclined fur to ate—at laste that’s what the docther sez.”

“Providing you’ve got something to eat!” I rejoined ruefully, for I knew there wouldn’t be much left if the gunroom fellows had cleared out. “What did Doctor Nettleby say was the matter with me, eh?”

“He s’id ye wor a comet, sor.”

“A comet?” I repeated, laughing. “You’re making a mistake, corporal.”

“The divil a ha’porth, sor. He called ye that same.”

“Nonsense, man!” I said. “The doctor made use of some medical term, probably, which you don’t understand.”

“Mebbe, sor, for I’m no scholard, worse luck!” replied the corporal, unconvinced. “The docther do sometime bring out one of them outlandish wurrds that nayther the divvil nor Father Murphy, more power to him! could make out at all at all; but, whin ye dhropped down this afthernoon on the dick alongside o’ yer chist, an’ I picked ye up, he says, sez he, ye was ayther a ‘comet,’ or in a ‘comet house,’ or somethin’ loike that, I’ll take me oath wid me dyin’ breath, though what the divvil he manes, I’m sure I can’t say, sor!”

“Oh, I see now!” I exclaimed, a light suddenly flashing on me as to his meaning. “I must have fainted away and the doctor told you I was in a comatose state, eh?”

“An’ isn’t that, sure, a comet, sor, as I tould ye!” cried the Irishman, triumphantly. “Hullo, here’s Peters, the cap’en’s stooard dodgin’ about the gangway. I wondther what he’s afther?”

I walked out of the cabin as he spoke, and the man he referred to came up to me at once.

“Beg pardon, sir,” said he, civilly, touching his forelock in salute. “Mr Vernon, sir, I believe?”

“Yes,” I replied, rather anxious to learn what was wanted of me, “that is my name.”

“Cap’en Farmer presents his compliments, sir, and requests the pleasure of your company to dinner this evening.”

“Give my compliments to the captain, and say that I shall be most happy to accept his kind invitation,” I answered, putting on my most dignified manner, as if it was quite an everyday occurrence for me to be asked to dinner by officers of the highest rank; though, I felt inclined to jump with joy at the prospect, especially under the circumstances of my famished condition. “What time do you serve up dinner, steward?”

“We allers dines at Four Bells, sir,” said he, with equal dignity, conscious of his position apparently as captain’s steward, and at the same time not oblivious of the fact that I was only a naval cadet. “In ten minutes time, sir, dinner will be on the table.”

“All right, my man, I’ll be there,” I replied in an off-hand way, as he went on towards the wardroom, opposite to where we were standing; and I added aside to the corporal, “I don’t think there’s any fear of my being late!”

“Faith, the divil doubt ye, sor,” said Macan in reply to this, breaking into a broad grin as he set to work methodically to put the doctor’s cabin straight again, while I turned to go below to my proper quarters, with the intention of making myself smart for the forthcoming feast. “Musha, I wudn’t loike to be the dish foreninst ye, sor, if ye can ate a hoss, as ye s’id jist now!”

A few minutes later, attired in my best uniform, I was ushered by the marine sentry, who stood without the doorway, into the big after-cabin beneath the poop that served for Captain Farmer’s reception-room.

This was a handsome apartment, hung round with pictures and decorated with choice hothouse flowers and evergreens, as unlike as possible anything one might expect to find on board ship.

The very gun-carriages on either side were concealed by drapery, as well as the windows at the further end which opened on to the stern gallery, that projected, like a balcony, over the shimmering sea beneath, whereon the lights from the ports played and danced on the rippling tide in a hundred broken reflections, the evening having closed in and it now being quite dark around.

I was received very kindly by Captain Farmer.

He was a short and rather stout man, so he looked uncommonly funny in his mess jacket, which, according to the custom of the service, was cut in the Eton fashion and gave him a striking resemblance to an over-grown schoolboy, as I thought; but, I soon forgot his appearance, his manner was so charming, while his anxiety to set me at my ease seemed as great as if I had been an admiral at the least, instead of being only little Jack Vernon, naval cadet!

The doctor was talking to him when I came in; and he spoke to me very cordially, too, feeling my pulse as he shook hands with me.

“Ha! No fear of your kicking the bucket yet, my little friend,” he said in his dry way, as we all proceeded into the fore cabin, where dinner was laid, Captain Farmer leading the way as soon as his steward Peters intimated that everything was ready. “No cold or fever after your sudden chill, thanks to my prescription! But, I won’t answer for consumption after your long fast. I can see from your eye, youngster, you’ll have a bad attack of that presently, eh? Ho, ho, ho!”

Of course I grinned at this; and, I may state at once, that, by the time the repast was concluded, I had fully justified the doctor’s sapient prediction, being blessed with the healthiest of appetites and a good digestion, which my temporary indisposition had in nowise impaired.

Mr Cheffinch, our gunnery lieutenant, who was one of the other guests, sat beside me, and from a remark or two he made I discovered that not only did he know of my adventure, but that the captain was also cognisant with the circumstances of the case, although the facts had not been officially communicated to him and he was not supposed to be aware of what had happened.

“He thinks you behaved very pluckily, youngster,” observed Mr Cheffinch in the most gracious way, when informing me of this. “Ay and so do we all in the wardroom, let me tell you!”

“I’m sure I don’t know what I have done to deserve your praise, sir,” said I, feeling quite abashed by all these compliments. “It was all an accident.”

“It is not so much what you did as what you didn’t do, youngster,” he replied, frankly enough. “You didn’t show any funk or make a fuss when you fell overboard, and you did not wish to get your messmates into a scrape when Dr Nettleby—he told us this himself in confidence—found out the state you were in and made inquiries. In so doing, you behaved like a true sailor and a gentleman, and we’re all proud to have such a promising brother officer amongst us, young Vernon, I assure you. If you go on as you have begun, you’ll be a credit to the service.”

Such a flattering eulogium made me blush like a peony, and I was very glad when the captain presently proposed the toast of “The Queen,” which we drank, all standing.

This being satisfactorily done, taking that hint from the doctor that I had “better turn in early and have a good night’s rest after all the exertions I had gone through,” as a sort of reminder that they had seen enough of me for the occasion, I paid my adieux to the captain and company and went on deck, where I remained while the watch was being called at Eight Bells.

I need hardly add that, in this interval, I ruminated over the strange succession of events that had taken place within so short a period; events which, possibly, might make, as they just as probably might have marred, my entire future career in the service—ay, and, perhaps, have ended it altogether, but for God’s good providence!

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