Chapter Ten.“Debtor and Creditor.”For a couple of days longer, we were as busy as bees, taking in our boats and spare spars and other gear, besides filling up our stock of provisions and water and completing with stores of all sorts; until Saturday arrived, the last day of our stay at Spithead, when all our preparations were finished and all hands, likewise, paid their advance of two months’ pay, prior to our sailing for China.No one was allowed on shore that afternoon, for fear of desertion; but, to make amends for this stoppage of all leave, the men were granted permission generally to receive their friends on board, so as to get rid of all the loose cash they were debarred from spending in more legitimate fashion on land.The consequence of this licence was, that the ship was crowded from stem to stern with strangers of every description, shape and sex, from dinner-time to dusk; Jew and Gentile, kinsman and creditor, each and all alike in turn, having a final tug at poor Jack’s purse-strings, striving to ease him of his superfluous wealth before departure.As may readily be imagined, some queer customers came aboard; and some curious scenes took place, both of the sentimental and comic order.One of these latter I especially noticed; for it occurred under my very eyes, within earshot of where I was standing by the gangway.“Downy,” as the men called him, the whilom digger of graves, who had so puzzled Commander Nesbitt on the first day of his joining, by giving his profession so peculiar a designation, had come on board without any sort of an outfit for the voyage.So, at last not being able to go ashore to buy a stock of clothes on receiving his advance pay, the purser at that time not supplying the men, as is the custom nowadays, with what they required, the morose gentleman was obliged to have recourse to Poll Nash, one of the bumboat women, who had brought off a lot of “slop” clothing for those requiring a rig-out, and was selling the same on her own terms to all comers as quickly as she could dispose of her stock.To her, therefore, Master “Downy” now applied, having nothing beyond the rather shabby suit of black in which he stood up, which was certainly somewhat unsuitable, to say the least, for a sailor’s wear, particularly a man-o’-war’s man, as the once gravedigger had been transformed into.He had well-nigh fully invested, in this way, the entire amount he had just received from the purser, Mr Nipper, on account of his advance pay as an “ordinary seaman,” that being his rating; when, I noticed, a dark-faced, long-nosed gentleman come up to him and speak.The two then got into a violent altercation that speedily attracted everyone’s attention, a small crowd gathering round the disputants just abaft the mainmast.“I tell you I haven’t a ha’penny left,” I heard “Downy” say, after a lot of words passing between them the gist of which I could not catch. “No, not a ha’penny left, I swear. I’ve paid it all to this good lady here for clothes!”“You haven’t paid me for the monkey jacket yet,” interposed Mrs Poll Nash, the bumboat woman, who was holding up the garment in question, waiting for the coin to be passed over before parting with it, the good lady having in her career learnt the wisdom of caution. “That’ll make three pun’ seventeen-and-six in all. Now, look sharp, my joker, or I’ll chuck the duds back into the wherry. I ain’t a-going to wait all day for my money, I tell you!”“I’ll let you have it in a minute,” whined “Downy,” who was apparently afraid to show what he had in his pocket, the dark gentleman’s eye being upon him. “Can’t you give a fellow time? I ain’t a-going to run away.”“Ye vood, ye liar, presshus shoon if ye ’ad arf a shance, I bet, s’help me!” shouted out the other man, who, from his speech, was evidently a Hebrew and a creditor. “Ye’re von tarn sheet, dat’s vot ye vas, a bloomin’ corpse swindler, vot sheets de living, s’help me, and rops ze dead! I shpit upon ye, I does!”“Come, come, you fellows there, I can’t allow such language on board this ship,” sang out from the poop Lieutenant Jellaby, the officer of the watch, when matters had come to this pass. “Ship’s corporal, bring those men here!”In obedience to this command, the two disputants were both brought aft, Poll Nash following also, being an interested party, to get back her clothes or the money from “Downy.”The latter was at once recognised by Lieutenant Jellaby, a jolly fellow, in whose watch I was. He went by his Christian name of “Joe” amongst us all, being very good-natured and always full of fun and chaff.“Hullo!” he exclaimed. “You’re the gravedigger, ain’t you?”“Yes, sir,” replied “Downy” sedately, as his original profession probably inculcated. “That were my humble calling, sir.”“Why did you give it up, eh?”“Trade got slack, sir.”“How was that?”“Porchmouth’s too healthy a place, sir,” answered the man, as grave as a judge. “People won’t die there fast enough, sir, for my trade; so I had to turn it up, ’cause I couldn’t make a decent living out of ’em.”“By burying them, I suppose?”“Yes, sir,” answered the man, seriously. “That is, when I were lucky enough to get a job.”“Well, that’s a rum start, a fellow complaining of not being able to make a living out of the dead!” said Joe Jellaby to me, smiling; and then, turning again to the man he continued, “now, tell me what all this row is about?”Here the Jew, who introduced himself as the keeper of a lodging-house in Portsea, put in his word.“Dis shcoundrel vas owe me five blooming pounds,” he cried out excitedly. “I vash keep him ven he vash shtarving; and now, ven he got money, he von’t shettle. He’s a shvindler and a tief, s’help me; and I shvear I’ll have the law on him!”“Why don’t you pay this man if you owe him anything?” said the lieutenant, sharply, to “Downy.”“You’ve received your advance money from the paymaster, have you not?”“Yes, sir; but I’d better tell you the whole story, sir,” said the ex-gravedigger. “I acknowledge owing Mister Isaacs some money, though he’s piled it on pretty thick, I must say; for I were four weeks out of work and had to board at his place.”“Yes, s’help me, and ate and drank of the best, too. Oh, Father Moses, how he did eat!” interrupted his creditor. “Look you, sir, it’s only a mean shcoundrel that voud call a pound a week too much for good vittles. I’ll put it thick on him, I will!”“Stop that, or I’ll have you turned out of the ship at once,” said Mr Jellaby, as the Jew made a dart at “Downy,” who dodged behind the marine sentry on the quarter-deck; while he repeated his injunction to the defaulter. “Pay the man his money and let him go.”“I can’t, sir. I’ve expended all my money in buying clothes of this good lady here,” explained Downy, pointing to the fat, old bumboat woman. “I hadn’t a stitch to my back and had to get a rig-out for the voyage, sir.”“Yes, sir, he’s ’ad three shirts, as is twelve-and-six, and cheap at the price, too, sir,” corroborated Mistress Poll Nash, with a low curtsey to the lieutenant. “Yes, sir, and two pair of trousers for thirty shillin’, besides a hoilskin and a serge jumper; and this monkey jacket here, sir, which makes three pun’ seventeen-and-six, sir.”“Well, well, I suppose the calculation is all right,” said Joe, laughing at her volubility and the queer way in which she bobbed a curtsey between each item of her catalogue. Then, addressing poor “Downy” he cried out curtly, “Turn out your pockets!”The ex-gravedigger sadly produced four sovereigns.“Is that all the money you’ve got?”“Yes, sir,” replied “Downy,” in a still more sepulchral tone. “Every ha’penny.”“Then, pay this woman here, for you must have a rig-out for the voyage,” said the lieutenant. “I’m afraid, Mr Isaacs, you’ll have to wait till your debtor returns from China for the settlement of your claim. Your friend, the gravedigger here, will then probably have lots of loot; and, be better able to discharge his debt.”“Ach, holy Moses!” cried the Jew, refusing with spluttering indignation the half-a-crown change “Downy” received from Polly Nash, and which he handed to his other creditor with great gravity as an instalment of his claim. “He vill nevaire gome back to bay me.”“Oh yes he will,” said Joe Jellaby, chaffingly, “and probably, he’ll bury you, too, for joy at seeing your pleasant face again—all for love, my man.”Mr Isaacs, however, got furious at this and used such abusive language both to “Downy” and the lieutenant that the latter gave orders at last for him to be shown over the side.This order was instantly carried out by the ship’s corporal, with the assistance of the master-at-arms, who had now arrived on the scene, when the incident terminated; but we could hear the Jew still cursing and swearing, and calling on his patron saint, Father Moses, for a long while after, as he was being rowed ashore.Shortly before evening quarters, all strangers were ordered also to go ashore; and, later on, the captain came off, bringing word that we were to sail early the following morning.I heard him tell Commander Nesbitt that he had better begin shortening in cable at daylight, so that we might weigh anchor immediately after breakfast.“Very good, sir,” the commander replied. “But who is this with you, sir—another youngster?”“Yes; he’s Admiral Mills’s son,” said Captain Farmer, much to my delight, for I had not noticed my old friend, Master Tom, who was the very last fellow I expected to see. “I have taken him to oblige his father, though he hasn’t quite completed his time on board theIllustrious.”“Oh, he won’t lose anything by that,” rejoined Commander Nesbitt, who did not have a very high opinion of my old training-ship, as I have already pointed out; and, just then, seeing me standing by, he said, “Take this young gentleman down to the gunroom, Vernon, and make him comfortable. I suppose you are already acquainted, both of you coming from the same ship?”“Oh yes, sir,” I answered glibly enough, overjoyed at having little Tommy Mills as a messmate once more. “He and I are old chums, sir.”“Indeed? Then there’s no need for my introducing you,” said the commander, with his genial laugh, which it was quite a pleasure to hear sometimes, it put one so much at one’s ease. “Mind though, youngster, not too much skylarking when you get below. We don’t want any more of that overboard business on board here, you know.”Of course I sniggered at this, understanding the allusion; but, naturally, Tom was not in the secret, and I had a good deal to tell him when I got him below.The two of us took our seats on one of the lockers in a quiet corner of the gunroom and had such a very long chat, that we were only interrupted by Larkyns flinging a boot at us at Four Bells, calling out that it was high time for us to turn in to our hammocks.He wanted to go to sleep he told us; for he would have to go on deck to take the middle watch at midnight, which was as close-handy as the boot he had sent at our heads to remind us!This set us both giggling, which brought the companion boot to our corner, where it thumped against the bulkhead, grazing little Tom’s nose and making him sniff.However, this second missile had the desired end of sending us off; and so we left Master Larkyns to enjoy his repose undisturbed any longer by our chatter.
For a couple of days longer, we were as busy as bees, taking in our boats and spare spars and other gear, besides filling up our stock of provisions and water and completing with stores of all sorts; until Saturday arrived, the last day of our stay at Spithead, when all our preparations were finished and all hands, likewise, paid their advance of two months’ pay, prior to our sailing for China.
No one was allowed on shore that afternoon, for fear of desertion; but, to make amends for this stoppage of all leave, the men were granted permission generally to receive their friends on board, so as to get rid of all the loose cash they were debarred from spending in more legitimate fashion on land.
The consequence of this licence was, that the ship was crowded from stem to stern with strangers of every description, shape and sex, from dinner-time to dusk; Jew and Gentile, kinsman and creditor, each and all alike in turn, having a final tug at poor Jack’s purse-strings, striving to ease him of his superfluous wealth before departure.
As may readily be imagined, some queer customers came aboard; and some curious scenes took place, both of the sentimental and comic order.
One of these latter I especially noticed; for it occurred under my very eyes, within earshot of where I was standing by the gangway.
“Downy,” as the men called him, the whilom digger of graves, who had so puzzled Commander Nesbitt on the first day of his joining, by giving his profession so peculiar a designation, had come on board without any sort of an outfit for the voyage.
So, at last not being able to go ashore to buy a stock of clothes on receiving his advance pay, the purser at that time not supplying the men, as is the custom nowadays, with what they required, the morose gentleman was obliged to have recourse to Poll Nash, one of the bumboat women, who had brought off a lot of “slop” clothing for those requiring a rig-out, and was selling the same on her own terms to all comers as quickly as she could dispose of her stock.
To her, therefore, Master “Downy” now applied, having nothing beyond the rather shabby suit of black in which he stood up, which was certainly somewhat unsuitable, to say the least, for a sailor’s wear, particularly a man-o’-war’s man, as the once gravedigger had been transformed into.
He had well-nigh fully invested, in this way, the entire amount he had just received from the purser, Mr Nipper, on account of his advance pay as an “ordinary seaman,” that being his rating; when, I noticed, a dark-faced, long-nosed gentleman come up to him and speak.
The two then got into a violent altercation that speedily attracted everyone’s attention, a small crowd gathering round the disputants just abaft the mainmast.
“I tell you I haven’t a ha’penny left,” I heard “Downy” say, after a lot of words passing between them the gist of which I could not catch. “No, not a ha’penny left, I swear. I’ve paid it all to this good lady here for clothes!”
“You haven’t paid me for the monkey jacket yet,” interposed Mrs Poll Nash, the bumboat woman, who was holding up the garment in question, waiting for the coin to be passed over before parting with it, the good lady having in her career learnt the wisdom of caution. “That’ll make three pun’ seventeen-and-six in all. Now, look sharp, my joker, or I’ll chuck the duds back into the wherry. I ain’t a-going to wait all day for my money, I tell you!”
“I’ll let you have it in a minute,” whined “Downy,” who was apparently afraid to show what he had in his pocket, the dark gentleman’s eye being upon him. “Can’t you give a fellow time? I ain’t a-going to run away.”
“Ye vood, ye liar, presshus shoon if ye ’ad arf a shance, I bet, s’help me!” shouted out the other man, who, from his speech, was evidently a Hebrew and a creditor. “Ye’re von tarn sheet, dat’s vot ye vas, a bloomin’ corpse swindler, vot sheets de living, s’help me, and rops ze dead! I shpit upon ye, I does!”
“Come, come, you fellows there, I can’t allow such language on board this ship,” sang out from the poop Lieutenant Jellaby, the officer of the watch, when matters had come to this pass. “Ship’s corporal, bring those men here!”
In obedience to this command, the two disputants were both brought aft, Poll Nash following also, being an interested party, to get back her clothes or the money from “Downy.”
The latter was at once recognised by Lieutenant Jellaby, a jolly fellow, in whose watch I was. He went by his Christian name of “Joe” amongst us all, being very good-natured and always full of fun and chaff.
“Hullo!” he exclaimed. “You’re the gravedigger, ain’t you?”
“Yes, sir,” replied “Downy” sedately, as his original profession probably inculcated. “That were my humble calling, sir.”
“Why did you give it up, eh?”
“Trade got slack, sir.”
“How was that?”
“Porchmouth’s too healthy a place, sir,” answered the man, as grave as a judge. “People won’t die there fast enough, sir, for my trade; so I had to turn it up, ’cause I couldn’t make a decent living out of ’em.”
“By burying them, I suppose?”
“Yes, sir,” answered the man, seriously. “That is, when I were lucky enough to get a job.”
“Well, that’s a rum start, a fellow complaining of not being able to make a living out of the dead!” said Joe Jellaby to me, smiling; and then, turning again to the man he continued, “now, tell me what all this row is about?”
Here the Jew, who introduced himself as the keeper of a lodging-house in Portsea, put in his word.
“Dis shcoundrel vas owe me five blooming pounds,” he cried out excitedly. “I vash keep him ven he vash shtarving; and now, ven he got money, he von’t shettle. He’s a shvindler and a tief, s’help me; and I shvear I’ll have the law on him!”
“Why don’t you pay this man if you owe him anything?” said the lieutenant, sharply, to “Downy.”
“You’ve received your advance money from the paymaster, have you not?”
“Yes, sir; but I’d better tell you the whole story, sir,” said the ex-gravedigger. “I acknowledge owing Mister Isaacs some money, though he’s piled it on pretty thick, I must say; for I were four weeks out of work and had to board at his place.”
“Yes, s’help me, and ate and drank of the best, too. Oh, Father Moses, how he did eat!” interrupted his creditor. “Look you, sir, it’s only a mean shcoundrel that voud call a pound a week too much for good vittles. I’ll put it thick on him, I will!”
“Stop that, or I’ll have you turned out of the ship at once,” said Mr Jellaby, as the Jew made a dart at “Downy,” who dodged behind the marine sentry on the quarter-deck; while he repeated his injunction to the defaulter. “Pay the man his money and let him go.”
“I can’t, sir. I’ve expended all my money in buying clothes of this good lady here,” explained Downy, pointing to the fat, old bumboat woman. “I hadn’t a stitch to my back and had to get a rig-out for the voyage, sir.”
“Yes, sir, he’s ’ad three shirts, as is twelve-and-six, and cheap at the price, too, sir,” corroborated Mistress Poll Nash, with a low curtsey to the lieutenant. “Yes, sir, and two pair of trousers for thirty shillin’, besides a hoilskin and a serge jumper; and this monkey jacket here, sir, which makes three pun’ seventeen-and-six, sir.”
“Well, well, I suppose the calculation is all right,” said Joe, laughing at her volubility and the queer way in which she bobbed a curtsey between each item of her catalogue. Then, addressing poor “Downy” he cried out curtly, “Turn out your pockets!”
The ex-gravedigger sadly produced four sovereigns.
“Is that all the money you’ve got?”
“Yes, sir,” replied “Downy,” in a still more sepulchral tone. “Every ha’penny.”
“Then, pay this woman here, for you must have a rig-out for the voyage,” said the lieutenant. “I’m afraid, Mr Isaacs, you’ll have to wait till your debtor returns from China for the settlement of your claim. Your friend, the gravedigger here, will then probably have lots of loot; and, be better able to discharge his debt.”
“Ach, holy Moses!” cried the Jew, refusing with spluttering indignation the half-a-crown change “Downy” received from Polly Nash, and which he handed to his other creditor with great gravity as an instalment of his claim. “He vill nevaire gome back to bay me.”
“Oh yes he will,” said Joe Jellaby, chaffingly, “and probably, he’ll bury you, too, for joy at seeing your pleasant face again—all for love, my man.”
Mr Isaacs, however, got furious at this and used such abusive language both to “Downy” and the lieutenant that the latter gave orders at last for him to be shown over the side.
This order was instantly carried out by the ship’s corporal, with the assistance of the master-at-arms, who had now arrived on the scene, when the incident terminated; but we could hear the Jew still cursing and swearing, and calling on his patron saint, Father Moses, for a long while after, as he was being rowed ashore.
Shortly before evening quarters, all strangers were ordered also to go ashore; and, later on, the captain came off, bringing word that we were to sail early the following morning.
I heard him tell Commander Nesbitt that he had better begin shortening in cable at daylight, so that we might weigh anchor immediately after breakfast.
“Very good, sir,” the commander replied. “But who is this with you, sir—another youngster?”
“Yes; he’s Admiral Mills’s son,” said Captain Farmer, much to my delight, for I had not noticed my old friend, Master Tom, who was the very last fellow I expected to see. “I have taken him to oblige his father, though he hasn’t quite completed his time on board theIllustrious.”
“Oh, he won’t lose anything by that,” rejoined Commander Nesbitt, who did not have a very high opinion of my old training-ship, as I have already pointed out; and, just then, seeing me standing by, he said, “Take this young gentleman down to the gunroom, Vernon, and make him comfortable. I suppose you are already acquainted, both of you coming from the same ship?”
“Oh yes, sir,” I answered glibly enough, overjoyed at having little Tommy Mills as a messmate once more. “He and I are old chums, sir.”
“Indeed? Then there’s no need for my introducing you,” said the commander, with his genial laugh, which it was quite a pleasure to hear sometimes, it put one so much at one’s ease. “Mind though, youngster, not too much skylarking when you get below. We don’t want any more of that overboard business on board here, you know.”
Of course I sniggered at this, understanding the allusion; but, naturally, Tom was not in the secret, and I had a good deal to tell him when I got him below.
The two of us took our seats on one of the lockers in a quiet corner of the gunroom and had such a very long chat, that we were only interrupted by Larkyns flinging a boot at us at Four Bells, calling out that it was high time for us to turn in to our hammocks.
He wanted to go to sleep he told us; for he would have to go on deck to take the middle watch at midnight, which was as close-handy as the boot he had sent at our heads to remind us!
This set us both giggling, which brought the companion boot to our corner, where it thumped against the bulkhead, grazing little Tom’s nose and making him sniff.
However, this second missile had the desired end of sending us off; and so we left Master Larkyns to enjoy his repose undisturbed any longer by our chatter.
Chapter Eleven.“Shortening in Cable.”“Rouse out, port watch and idlers! Rouse out! rouse out!” hoarsely shouted out the boatswain’s mates along the lower deck; and this call, mingled with the shrill piping wail of their whistles and the tramp of hurrying feet as the men straggled up the hatchway to stow their hammocks in the nettings above, awoke me from my slumbers next morning in the dreary semi-darkness of the so-called daylight.I was so tired and sleepy that I was hardly half-roused even by all this uproar. Indeed, I was just dropping off again, when Dick Andrews, one of my fellow cadets from the training-ship, who had joined theCandaharthe same time as myself and was rather a bumptious and overbearing sort of chap, shook me violently.“Turn out, you lazy lubber, turn out,” he shouted. “It’s long past Eight Bells, and old Bitpin, who has taken Joe Jellaby’s watch and is looking after the men scrubbing decks, has been asking for you. He’s in a fine temper this morning, Master John Vernon, I can tell you; so, you’d better look sharp, my lad, or you’ll ‘catch Tommy’ when he sees you.”“Oh, bother!” I cried, with a yawn that nearly dislocated my jaw, shoving a leg over the side of my hammock lazily enough, loth to leave my snug, warm nest for the cold, uncomfortable quarter-deck, where I knew there would be a lot of water sluicing about and the men holystoning, to make it more unpleasant. “I wish you wouldn’t call me names, Andrews! You’re not so awfully smart at rousing out yourself, that you can afford to brag about it! Why, Larkyns had to drag you round the gunroom last night in your nightshirt before he could make you wake up.”“Larkyns is a bully!” exclaimed Andrews, angrily. “He’s a mean, cowardly bully!”“Is he, my joker?” said that identical individual, whose approach was unnoticed by either of us, catching his slanderer a crack on the head which sent him spinning. “There, take that in proof of your statement! If I’m a bully, Mr Andrews, I must act as such, or you’ll call me a liar next!”“I was only joking,” snivelled Dick, picking himself up and rubbing his cheek ruefully. “I didn’t mean anything.”“Neither did I,” replied Larkyns, drily, as he peeled off his jacket and the thick woollen comforter he had wrapped round his neck to keep out the chilly night air, and prepared to turn in after his watch on deck so as to have a nice snooze before breakfast. “I only gave you a striking proof of my devoted friendship for you, old chappie, that’s all!”With which parting words, he dexterously jumped into his hammock, rolling himself up like a worm in the blankets within; and, such was the facility of habit, I declare he was snoring like a grampus ere I had completed my dressing, although I scrambled into my clothes as quickly as I could, and hurried out of the steerage.I left Dick Andrews still rubbing his cheek disconsolately and muttering impotent threats against his now unconscious assailant; but, he didn’t do this until he was certain Larkyns could not hear good wishes on his behalf!On going up the hatchway, I found all hands busy scrubbing and washing down the decks, which were in a precious mess.There was a fair division of labour in carrying out the operation, the topmen and after-guard scouring the planks with sand; after which the decks were flushed fore and aft with floods of water pumped up by the “idlers.”Those are really a most useful and industrious class of misnamed men consisting of the carpenters, sailmakers, coopers, blacksmiths and other artificers, besides the cook’s mates and yeomen of stores.In our ship the lot numbered no less than some seventy in all, who every morning assisted in this praiseworthy task!Creeping up as quietly as I could and trying to avoid observation from the squinting eye of Mr Bitpin, our fourth lieutenant, who was the oldest in seniority although he occupied such a subordinate position, I made my way to the side of Ned Anstruther, the midshipman of the watch, who stood on the weather side of the quarter-deck on a coil of rope so as to keep his feet out of the way of the water that was swishing round.Ned nodded me a greeting; and, I fancied myself safe, when in an instant my presence was noted by the lieutenant, who turned on me.“Hullo, youngster!” he called out, looking down from the break of the poop, whence he had been surveying operations, finding fault with the men beneath in quick succession, according to his general wont, and having a snap and a snarl at everyone. His temper, never a good one originally, had been soured by a bad digestion and ill luck in the way of promotion, the poor beggar having been passed over repeatedly by men younger than himself. “How is it you were not here when the watch was mustered?”“I’m very sorry, sir,” said I, apologetically. “I overslept myself, sir.”“Oh, indeed? You’d better not be late again when I’m officer of the watch, or I’ll have you spread-eagled in the mizzen rigging as a warning to others, like they nail up crows against a barn door ashore. That’ll make you sharper next time, my joker! Do you hear me, youngster?”“Yes, sir,” said I, touching my cap. “I hear you, sir.”“Very well, then. Mind you heed as well as hear!” he replied snappishly, rather disappointed, I thought, at my making no further answer, or trying to argue the point with him. “You can go down now to the wardroom steward and tell him to get me a cup of coffee as quickly as he can. Now, don’t be a month of Sundays about it! Say it must be hot and strong, and not like that dish-water he brought me yesterday; or, I’ll put him in the list and stop his grog! Do you hear me?”“Yes, sir,” I said respectfully as before, giving no occasion for offence so as to come in for more grumbling on his part. “I hear you, sir.”“Confound that youngster, I can’t catch him anyhow!” I heard him mutter to himself as if uttering his thoughts aloud, as I turned away with another touch of my cap and left the quarter-deck to fulfil my errand. “He’s like those monkeys at the Rock—too artful to speak. Keeps his tripping lines too taut for that!”He was quite right; for, three weeks’ association on board, though I had been brought little in contact with him, had taught me to know his character pretty well. I had learnt that the best way to get on with Mr Bitpin was, to let him do all the talking and only to answer him when necessity required.It was advisable also that the reply should be made in the fewest words possible, such a course giving him no ground for further complaint.When I returned, some few minutes later, with the desired refreshment for the lieutenant, which I brought up myself, thus saving the wardroom steward, who was a very decent fellow, a probable wigging besides getting a cup of coffee myself as a bonus for performing the service, I found the decks swabbed and almost dry; the ropes, too, were all coiled and flemished down handsomely, and everything around looking as neat as a new pin.Mr Bitpin, also, was in a better humour, a sip of the smoking coffee, which apparently was just to his taste, adding to his content at the scrubbing operations having been accomplished to his satisfaction.“Thank you, my boy, for bringing this,” he said, with a smack of his lips as he took a good long gulp of the grateful fluid, giving an approving nod to me. “That lazy steward would have taken half-an-hour at least if you had left it to him. When I’m as young as you are, I’ll do as much for you.”I grinned at this, as did Ned Anstruther, who likewise winked in a knowing way to me behind Mr Bitpin’s broad back; but, before I could reply to the lieutenant’s complimentary speech, Commander Nesbitt made his appearance on the poop, having come up the after-hatchway and gone into and out of the captain’s cabin again, without either of us seeing him.“Ah, good morning, Mr Bitpin,” he said, looking somewhat surprised at seeing that gentleman there. “I thought Mr Jellaby had the morning watch to-day?”“So he had, sir,” answered the lieutenant, hastily putting down his empty cup under the binnacle out of sight of the commander, who he knew disliked anything out of order on deck. “But, sir, Mr Jellaby was late off last night from the admiral’s ball, and he begged me to take the duty for him. It is a great nuisance; for, I only turned in at Two Bells in the middle watch, myself. Of course, though, I couldn’t be disobliging, you know, sir.”“Of course not, Mr Bitpin,” said Commander Nesbitt, amused at this unexpected piece of good nature from one who very seldom put himself out for anybody. “It does not matter in the least; but, I told Jellaby I wished to shorten in cable as soon as the decks were washed down.”“He didn’t tell me anything about that, sir, when he came on board this morning; for I met him at the gangway,” growled out the crusty lieutenant in his usual surly way. “He was full of some Miss Thingamy’s dancing and made me sick by telling me at least twenty times over what a ‘chawming gurl’ she was!”“No doubt of that. He’s a rare chap amongst the ladies, is our friend Jellaby!” said Commander Nesbitt laughing at Mr Bitpin’s imitation of Joe’s favourite expression. “We must see now, though, about shortening in without any further delay, for time’s getting on.”“Very good, sir,” replied the lieutenant, dropping his unwonted jocularity and relapsing into his matter-of-fact official manner. “I’d better go on the fo’c’s’le and join Mr Morgan, the mate of the watch, who’s already there.”“Thank you, Mr Bitpin,” briefly said the commander by way of dismissal; and then, bending over the poop-rail, he called out, “Bosun’s mate! Pipe all hands to shorten cable!”“Ay, ay, sir,” answered the petty officer addressed, putting his whistle to his mouth and blowing a shrill, ear-piercing call that echoed through the ship and was taken up by his brother mates below on the main and lower decks, whose voices could be heard, in every key, gruffly shouting out fore and aft, until the sound gradually died away in the distant recesses of the hold, “All hands, shorten cable!”Immediately, as if touched by an enchanter’s wand, the quiet that had reigned on board since the decks had been washed down disappeared, and all was bustle and apparent confusion; although, it need hardly be said, order was paramount everywhere.Such, indeed, is always on board a man-of-war, where each man knows his place and takes care to be in it as quickly as he can; especially when “all hands” are called as in the present instance.In this case, as now, all the crew turn out and come on deck to their stations, whether it be their watch below or not.Up, therefore, tumbled the men of the starboard watch, who had only been relieved from duty an hour before, at the same time I was first roused out by the obliging Dick Andrews.After the men, but a little more leisurely, came the other officers not already on deck.Amongst these were, the Honourable Digby Lanyard, our swell first lieutenant, eyeglass in eye as usual, and dressed as neatly as if going to divisions, although he had only such very short notice for his toilet; Joe Jellaby, the proper officer of my watch, whose place Mr Bitpin had taken for the nonce, rubbing his eyes and only half awake from his dreams of “that chawming gurl” at the admiral’s ball; Charley Gilham, our third lieutenant, a manly, blue-eyed sailor and fond of his profession, but no bookworm and bad at head-work; Mr Cheffinch, or “Gunnery Jack” as he was styled; the three other mates; and, all the middies and cadets, including Larkyns.The latter was wroth at his ante-prandial snooze being so suddenly cut short; while Andrews, who followed in his rear, was savage at meeting his late antagonist so soon again, his friendly feelings towards whom were not increased by the foot of Larkyns giving him a “lift” up the hatchway as the pair scrambled on deck together, the cadet, unfortunately for himself, being a trifle ahead of the midshipman.The first lieutenant, or “glass-eye” as the men called him, went out at once on the forecastle, where a number of the hands, under the superintendence of Mr Hawser, the boatswain, were already engaged rigging the fish davit and overhauling the anchor gear, with Mr Bitpin and Morgan looking on to see that everything was done properly.“Charley” Gilham, and “Gunnery Jack,” stopped down on the main deck to look after the capstan, which was soon surrounded by a squad of “jollies” under the command of one of the marine officers, Lieutenant Wagstaff, a fellow as tall as a maypole and with a headpiece of very similar material!Mr Jellaby, however, not knowing where his deputy, Mr Bitpin, might be, came up on the quarter-deck; but he had no sooner appeared there than the commander despatched him to another station.“Please go down at once to the lower deck, Mr Jellaby,” said he, on catching sight of him. “I want you to attend to the working of the cables. See how smart you can be with those new hands we have from the foretop!”“Very good, sir,” replied “Joe,” all on the alert in an instant. “I will go down directly.”Away he accordingly went; whereupon, I, having nothing special to do, and seeing everyone else appointed to some station or other, was just scuttling down the hatchway after him when the Commander called me back.“Stop here, Mr Vernon,” he cried. “I want you to act as my messenger again. Try if you can be as useful as the one they have to bring in the cable with. I suppose you know what sort of ‘messenger’ that is, eh?”“Oh, yes, sir,” I replied glibly enough. “It is a species of endless chain, passing round the base of the capstan amidships, and through a stationary block called a ‘controller’ on the forepart of the lower deck, to which the cable is attached by nippers as it comes through the hawse-hole inboard; and, as the capstan is hove round, the messenger drags the cable up, the nippers being released and taken forward again to get a fresh grip, while the slack of the cable passes down the deck pipes into the cable lockers below, sir.”“Very well answered, youngster,” said Commander Nesbitt, approvingly, when I had reeled off this long yarn. “But, I think, it’s about time for Mr Jellaby to give us the signal for heaving round now.”He liked things done smartly, did the commander, for he knew how they should be done; and, being prompt and ready in his own actions, judged others by himself.Barely five minutes had elapsed since “all hands” had been piped, and in that interval the cable had to be unbitted and the “slip” stopping it to the deck knocked off by the blacksmith.In addition to this, the messenger had to be brought up to the unbitted end and the nippers gripped on before those working the capstan on the main deck above could commence heaving round in order to “bring in the shekels, like unto the Israelites of old and the Hebrews of the present day,” as Master Larkyns explained to me later; and yet, the commander grew impatient at the delay, in spite of all this having to be done in such a short space of time.But, at last, the signal was given.“Heave round!” snouted Mr Jellaby from the extreme fore-end of the lower deck, where he had been bustling up the topmen and seeing to the messenger being properly attached to the cable.“Heave round,” also cried Sylvester, one of the midshipmen with him.“Heave round,” repeated the boatswain’s mate further aft; while his fellow mates stationed along the hatchways above passed on the cry, till it reached the commander on the poop, who in his full-toned voice now transformed what was merely a signal that all was ready into an order.This gave the required impetus to the working party on the main deck, who were waiting for this order, really to “Heave round!”At once, the drummer and bugler, in attendance on the eager marines and after-guard, struck up with fife and drum the festive strains of “Judy Calaghan,” which Corporal Macan said “did his sowl good to hear, faith!”Then, the bars having been previously shipped by Mr Cleete, the carpenter and his crew, round tramped the “jollies,” round went the capstan; and, with it, the messenger, the endless chain of which, revolving slowly, hauled the cable foot by foot inboard, the “lengths” dropping down the deck pipes out of the way as the slack was released from the messenger, and the nippers passed forwards again; and so on, over and over again!I had ample opportunity for noticing this, the commander sending me on another errand down to the scene of operations almost as soon as the drumming and fifing began. This was much to my delight; for I enjoyed the strains of the jolly air played as much as Corporal Macan, as well as the steady tramp of the marines and after-guard round the capstan, the men stamping on the deck in time to the music, as if they would smash through the planking.“Go and tell Mr Jellaby,” said he, “to shorten in to two shackles.”“Ay, ay, sir.”With which response to Commander Nesbitt’s order, I sprang down the after-hatchway on to the main deck, proceeding thence below to where old “Joe” and his topmen were working.Of course I gave the lieutenant the mandate with which I had been charged; but I remaining, boylike, to watch what was going on, the commander not having told me to return immediately, though I ought to have done so.The capstan, however, was spun round so merrily by the marines while the nippers, in the hands of the active seamen, passed so freely; that, ere I knew how far the task had progressed, so as to be able to report to the commander the state of things, Mr Jellaby suddenly sang out “Belay!”Instantly, the word being passed by the boatswain’s mates as before, so that the order reached the lieutenant in charge of the working party at the capstan above almost as soon as Mr Jellaby sang out from the lower deck forward, the music stopped suddenly, as if the drummer and fifer had both been shot on the spot.With it, too, ceased the monotonous tramp, tramp, tramp of the men above our heads, which sounded through the thickness of the deck like a band of Ethiopian minstrels dancing a flap dance and marching “round the mulberry bush” afterwards, to “show their muscle,” as is the wont of these negro “entertainers,” so-called!“You may go up now to the commander,” said Mr Jellaby to me, as a polite hint to be off, “and tell him that the second shackle’s just inside our hawse.”“Very good, sir,” I replied, moving away as the blacksmith went to put the slip on the cable to secure it from running out until we were ready to weigh anchor later on. “I’ll tell him at once, sir.”“All right,” said Commander Nesbitt, when I reached the poop and repeated Mr Jellaby’s message, the import of which he already knew from the stoppage of all movement below, and the report of the boatswain from the forecastle that the anchor was “a short stay apeak”; when, advancing to the rail, he called out in a louder key, “Bosun’s mate, pipe the hands to breakfast!”
“Rouse out, port watch and idlers! Rouse out! rouse out!” hoarsely shouted out the boatswain’s mates along the lower deck; and this call, mingled with the shrill piping wail of their whistles and the tramp of hurrying feet as the men straggled up the hatchway to stow their hammocks in the nettings above, awoke me from my slumbers next morning in the dreary semi-darkness of the so-called daylight.
I was so tired and sleepy that I was hardly half-roused even by all this uproar. Indeed, I was just dropping off again, when Dick Andrews, one of my fellow cadets from the training-ship, who had joined theCandaharthe same time as myself and was rather a bumptious and overbearing sort of chap, shook me violently.
“Turn out, you lazy lubber, turn out,” he shouted. “It’s long past Eight Bells, and old Bitpin, who has taken Joe Jellaby’s watch and is looking after the men scrubbing decks, has been asking for you. He’s in a fine temper this morning, Master John Vernon, I can tell you; so, you’d better look sharp, my lad, or you’ll ‘catch Tommy’ when he sees you.”
“Oh, bother!” I cried, with a yawn that nearly dislocated my jaw, shoving a leg over the side of my hammock lazily enough, loth to leave my snug, warm nest for the cold, uncomfortable quarter-deck, where I knew there would be a lot of water sluicing about and the men holystoning, to make it more unpleasant. “I wish you wouldn’t call me names, Andrews! You’re not so awfully smart at rousing out yourself, that you can afford to brag about it! Why, Larkyns had to drag you round the gunroom last night in your nightshirt before he could make you wake up.”
“Larkyns is a bully!” exclaimed Andrews, angrily. “He’s a mean, cowardly bully!”
“Is he, my joker?” said that identical individual, whose approach was unnoticed by either of us, catching his slanderer a crack on the head which sent him spinning. “There, take that in proof of your statement! If I’m a bully, Mr Andrews, I must act as such, or you’ll call me a liar next!”
“I was only joking,” snivelled Dick, picking himself up and rubbing his cheek ruefully. “I didn’t mean anything.”
“Neither did I,” replied Larkyns, drily, as he peeled off his jacket and the thick woollen comforter he had wrapped round his neck to keep out the chilly night air, and prepared to turn in after his watch on deck so as to have a nice snooze before breakfast. “I only gave you a striking proof of my devoted friendship for you, old chappie, that’s all!”
With which parting words, he dexterously jumped into his hammock, rolling himself up like a worm in the blankets within; and, such was the facility of habit, I declare he was snoring like a grampus ere I had completed my dressing, although I scrambled into my clothes as quickly as I could, and hurried out of the steerage.
I left Dick Andrews still rubbing his cheek disconsolately and muttering impotent threats against his now unconscious assailant; but, he didn’t do this until he was certain Larkyns could not hear good wishes on his behalf!
On going up the hatchway, I found all hands busy scrubbing and washing down the decks, which were in a precious mess.
There was a fair division of labour in carrying out the operation, the topmen and after-guard scouring the planks with sand; after which the decks were flushed fore and aft with floods of water pumped up by the “idlers.”
Those are really a most useful and industrious class of misnamed men consisting of the carpenters, sailmakers, coopers, blacksmiths and other artificers, besides the cook’s mates and yeomen of stores.
In our ship the lot numbered no less than some seventy in all, who every morning assisted in this praiseworthy task!
Creeping up as quietly as I could and trying to avoid observation from the squinting eye of Mr Bitpin, our fourth lieutenant, who was the oldest in seniority although he occupied such a subordinate position, I made my way to the side of Ned Anstruther, the midshipman of the watch, who stood on the weather side of the quarter-deck on a coil of rope so as to keep his feet out of the way of the water that was swishing round.
Ned nodded me a greeting; and, I fancied myself safe, when in an instant my presence was noted by the lieutenant, who turned on me.
“Hullo, youngster!” he called out, looking down from the break of the poop, whence he had been surveying operations, finding fault with the men beneath in quick succession, according to his general wont, and having a snap and a snarl at everyone. His temper, never a good one originally, had been soured by a bad digestion and ill luck in the way of promotion, the poor beggar having been passed over repeatedly by men younger than himself. “How is it you were not here when the watch was mustered?”
“I’m very sorry, sir,” said I, apologetically. “I overslept myself, sir.”
“Oh, indeed? You’d better not be late again when I’m officer of the watch, or I’ll have you spread-eagled in the mizzen rigging as a warning to others, like they nail up crows against a barn door ashore. That’ll make you sharper next time, my joker! Do you hear me, youngster?”
“Yes, sir,” said I, touching my cap. “I hear you, sir.”
“Very well, then. Mind you heed as well as hear!” he replied snappishly, rather disappointed, I thought, at my making no further answer, or trying to argue the point with him. “You can go down now to the wardroom steward and tell him to get me a cup of coffee as quickly as he can. Now, don’t be a month of Sundays about it! Say it must be hot and strong, and not like that dish-water he brought me yesterday; or, I’ll put him in the list and stop his grog! Do you hear me?”
“Yes, sir,” I said respectfully as before, giving no occasion for offence so as to come in for more grumbling on his part. “I hear you, sir.”
“Confound that youngster, I can’t catch him anyhow!” I heard him mutter to himself as if uttering his thoughts aloud, as I turned away with another touch of my cap and left the quarter-deck to fulfil my errand. “He’s like those monkeys at the Rock—too artful to speak. Keeps his tripping lines too taut for that!”
He was quite right; for, three weeks’ association on board, though I had been brought little in contact with him, had taught me to know his character pretty well. I had learnt that the best way to get on with Mr Bitpin was, to let him do all the talking and only to answer him when necessity required.
It was advisable also that the reply should be made in the fewest words possible, such a course giving him no ground for further complaint.
When I returned, some few minutes later, with the desired refreshment for the lieutenant, which I brought up myself, thus saving the wardroom steward, who was a very decent fellow, a probable wigging besides getting a cup of coffee myself as a bonus for performing the service, I found the decks swabbed and almost dry; the ropes, too, were all coiled and flemished down handsomely, and everything around looking as neat as a new pin.
Mr Bitpin, also, was in a better humour, a sip of the smoking coffee, which apparently was just to his taste, adding to his content at the scrubbing operations having been accomplished to his satisfaction.
“Thank you, my boy, for bringing this,” he said, with a smack of his lips as he took a good long gulp of the grateful fluid, giving an approving nod to me. “That lazy steward would have taken half-an-hour at least if you had left it to him. When I’m as young as you are, I’ll do as much for you.”
I grinned at this, as did Ned Anstruther, who likewise winked in a knowing way to me behind Mr Bitpin’s broad back; but, before I could reply to the lieutenant’s complimentary speech, Commander Nesbitt made his appearance on the poop, having come up the after-hatchway and gone into and out of the captain’s cabin again, without either of us seeing him.
“Ah, good morning, Mr Bitpin,” he said, looking somewhat surprised at seeing that gentleman there. “I thought Mr Jellaby had the morning watch to-day?”
“So he had, sir,” answered the lieutenant, hastily putting down his empty cup under the binnacle out of sight of the commander, who he knew disliked anything out of order on deck. “But, sir, Mr Jellaby was late off last night from the admiral’s ball, and he begged me to take the duty for him. It is a great nuisance; for, I only turned in at Two Bells in the middle watch, myself. Of course, though, I couldn’t be disobliging, you know, sir.”
“Of course not, Mr Bitpin,” said Commander Nesbitt, amused at this unexpected piece of good nature from one who very seldom put himself out for anybody. “It does not matter in the least; but, I told Jellaby I wished to shorten in cable as soon as the decks were washed down.”
“He didn’t tell me anything about that, sir, when he came on board this morning; for I met him at the gangway,” growled out the crusty lieutenant in his usual surly way. “He was full of some Miss Thingamy’s dancing and made me sick by telling me at least twenty times over what a ‘chawming gurl’ she was!”
“No doubt of that. He’s a rare chap amongst the ladies, is our friend Jellaby!” said Commander Nesbitt laughing at Mr Bitpin’s imitation of Joe’s favourite expression. “We must see now, though, about shortening in without any further delay, for time’s getting on.”
“Very good, sir,” replied the lieutenant, dropping his unwonted jocularity and relapsing into his matter-of-fact official manner. “I’d better go on the fo’c’s’le and join Mr Morgan, the mate of the watch, who’s already there.”
“Thank you, Mr Bitpin,” briefly said the commander by way of dismissal; and then, bending over the poop-rail, he called out, “Bosun’s mate! Pipe all hands to shorten cable!”
“Ay, ay, sir,” answered the petty officer addressed, putting his whistle to his mouth and blowing a shrill, ear-piercing call that echoed through the ship and was taken up by his brother mates below on the main and lower decks, whose voices could be heard, in every key, gruffly shouting out fore and aft, until the sound gradually died away in the distant recesses of the hold, “All hands, shorten cable!”
Immediately, as if touched by an enchanter’s wand, the quiet that had reigned on board since the decks had been washed down disappeared, and all was bustle and apparent confusion; although, it need hardly be said, order was paramount everywhere.
Such, indeed, is always on board a man-of-war, where each man knows his place and takes care to be in it as quickly as he can; especially when “all hands” are called as in the present instance.
In this case, as now, all the crew turn out and come on deck to their stations, whether it be their watch below or not.
Up, therefore, tumbled the men of the starboard watch, who had only been relieved from duty an hour before, at the same time I was first roused out by the obliging Dick Andrews.
After the men, but a little more leisurely, came the other officers not already on deck.
Amongst these were, the Honourable Digby Lanyard, our swell first lieutenant, eyeglass in eye as usual, and dressed as neatly as if going to divisions, although he had only such very short notice for his toilet; Joe Jellaby, the proper officer of my watch, whose place Mr Bitpin had taken for the nonce, rubbing his eyes and only half awake from his dreams of “that chawming gurl” at the admiral’s ball; Charley Gilham, our third lieutenant, a manly, blue-eyed sailor and fond of his profession, but no bookworm and bad at head-work; Mr Cheffinch, or “Gunnery Jack” as he was styled; the three other mates; and, all the middies and cadets, including Larkyns.
The latter was wroth at his ante-prandial snooze being so suddenly cut short; while Andrews, who followed in his rear, was savage at meeting his late antagonist so soon again, his friendly feelings towards whom were not increased by the foot of Larkyns giving him a “lift” up the hatchway as the pair scrambled on deck together, the cadet, unfortunately for himself, being a trifle ahead of the midshipman.
The first lieutenant, or “glass-eye” as the men called him, went out at once on the forecastle, where a number of the hands, under the superintendence of Mr Hawser, the boatswain, were already engaged rigging the fish davit and overhauling the anchor gear, with Mr Bitpin and Morgan looking on to see that everything was done properly.
“Charley” Gilham, and “Gunnery Jack,” stopped down on the main deck to look after the capstan, which was soon surrounded by a squad of “jollies” under the command of one of the marine officers, Lieutenant Wagstaff, a fellow as tall as a maypole and with a headpiece of very similar material!
Mr Jellaby, however, not knowing where his deputy, Mr Bitpin, might be, came up on the quarter-deck; but he had no sooner appeared there than the commander despatched him to another station.
“Please go down at once to the lower deck, Mr Jellaby,” said he, on catching sight of him. “I want you to attend to the working of the cables. See how smart you can be with those new hands we have from the foretop!”
“Very good, sir,” replied “Joe,” all on the alert in an instant. “I will go down directly.”
Away he accordingly went; whereupon, I, having nothing special to do, and seeing everyone else appointed to some station or other, was just scuttling down the hatchway after him when the Commander called me back.
“Stop here, Mr Vernon,” he cried. “I want you to act as my messenger again. Try if you can be as useful as the one they have to bring in the cable with. I suppose you know what sort of ‘messenger’ that is, eh?”
“Oh, yes, sir,” I replied glibly enough. “It is a species of endless chain, passing round the base of the capstan amidships, and through a stationary block called a ‘controller’ on the forepart of the lower deck, to which the cable is attached by nippers as it comes through the hawse-hole inboard; and, as the capstan is hove round, the messenger drags the cable up, the nippers being released and taken forward again to get a fresh grip, while the slack of the cable passes down the deck pipes into the cable lockers below, sir.”
“Very well answered, youngster,” said Commander Nesbitt, approvingly, when I had reeled off this long yarn. “But, I think, it’s about time for Mr Jellaby to give us the signal for heaving round now.”
He liked things done smartly, did the commander, for he knew how they should be done; and, being prompt and ready in his own actions, judged others by himself.
Barely five minutes had elapsed since “all hands” had been piped, and in that interval the cable had to be unbitted and the “slip” stopping it to the deck knocked off by the blacksmith.
In addition to this, the messenger had to be brought up to the unbitted end and the nippers gripped on before those working the capstan on the main deck above could commence heaving round in order to “bring in the shekels, like unto the Israelites of old and the Hebrews of the present day,” as Master Larkyns explained to me later; and yet, the commander grew impatient at the delay, in spite of all this having to be done in such a short space of time.
But, at last, the signal was given.
“Heave round!” snouted Mr Jellaby from the extreme fore-end of the lower deck, where he had been bustling up the topmen and seeing to the messenger being properly attached to the cable.
“Heave round,” also cried Sylvester, one of the midshipmen with him.
“Heave round,” repeated the boatswain’s mate further aft; while his fellow mates stationed along the hatchways above passed on the cry, till it reached the commander on the poop, who in his full-toned voice now transformed what was merely a signal that all was ready into an order.
This gave the required impetus to the working party on the main deck, who were waiting for this order, really to “Heave round!”
At once, the drummer and bugler, in attendance on the eager marines and after-guard, struck up with fife and drum the festive strains of “Judy Calaghan,” which Corporal Macan said “did his sowl good to hear, faith!”
Then, the bars having been previously shipped by Mr Cleete, the carpenter and his crew, round tramped the “jollies,” round went the capstan; and, with it, the messenger, the endless chain of which, revolving slowly, hauled the cable foot by foot inboard, the “lengths” dropping down the deck pipes out of the way as the slack was released from the messenger, and the nippers passed forwards again; and so on, over and over again!
I had ample opportunity for noticing this, the commander sending me on another errand down to the scene of operations almost as soon as the drumming and fifing began. This was much to my delight; for I enjoyed the strains of the jolly air played as much as Corporal Macan, as well as the steady tramp of the marines and after-guard round the capstan, the men stamping on the deck in time to the music, as if they would smash through the planking.
“Go and tell Mr Jellaby,” said he, “to shorten in to two shackles.”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
With which response to Commander Nesbitt’s order, I sprang down the after-hatchway on to the main deck, proceeding thence below to where old “Joe” and his topmen were working.
Of course I gave the lieutenant the mandate with which I had been charged; but I remaining, boylike, to watch what was going on, the commander not having told me to return immediately, though I ought to have done so.
The capstan, however, was spun round so merrily by the marines while the nippers, in the hands of the active seamen, passed so freely; that, ere I knew how far the task had progressed, so as to be able to report to the commander the state of things, Mr Jellaby suddenly sang out “Belay!”
Instantly, the word being passed by the boatswain’s mates as before, so that the order reached the lieutenant in charge of the working party at the capstan above almost as soon as Mr Jellaby sang out from the lower deck forward, the music stopped suddenly, as if the drummer and fifer had both been shot on the spot.
With it, too, ceased the monotonous tramp, tramp, tramp of the men above our heads, which sounded through the thickness of the deck like a band of Ethiopian minstrels dancing a flap dance and marching “round the mulberry bush” afterwards, to “show their muscle,” as is the wont of these negro “entertainers,” so-called!
“You may go up now to the commander,” said Mr Jellaby to me, as a polite hint to be off, “and tell him that the second shackle’s just inside our hawse.”
“Very good, sir,” I replied, moving away as the blacksmith went to put the slip on the cable to secure it from running out until we were ready to weigh anchor later on. “I’ll tell him at once, sir.”
“All right,” said Commander Nesbitt, when I reached the poop and repeated Mr Jellaby’s message, the import of which he already knew from the stoppage of all movement below, and the report of the boatswain from the forecastle that the anchor was “a short stay apeak”; when, advancing to the rail, he called out in a louder key, “Bosun’s mate, pipe the hands to breakfast!”
Chapter Twelve.Below in the Gunroom.“Well!” exclaimed little Tommy Mills, a little later, when he and I, with young Morgan, the mate and Ned Anstruther, on being relieved by the starboard watch, all went down to the gunroom and sat down to have our breakfast, “I call this a beastly shame.”“Hullo,” said Popplethorne, one of the other middies, looking up from the plate on which he was busily engaged; while several other fellows, similarly employed ceased operations likewise, staring at Tommy in astonishment. “What’s up?”“Nothing’s up, but everything seems down,” replied my little chum in an aggrieved tone. “I don’t see a crumb left for a poor, hungry chap; no bloaters, no marmalade, no nothing. When I was in theIllustrious, if they did grind a fellow a bit, one always had something decent to eat, at all events!”“First come, first served,” mumbled Phil Plumper, the senior mate of our watch, who had his mouth full and was tucking in some species of “burgoo,” or porridge with much gusto. He was an awfully fat fellow and looked just like a boiled lobster bursting out of its shell, for the buttons of his jacket were continually carrying away at odd moments. “If you don’t look out for yourself on board ship you’ll find nobody ’ll look after you; and, you’ll come offminus!”“That’ll never be your case,” retorted Tommy, with a snigger. “Judging by appearances, I should say your condition represents aplusquantity!”“Beg pardon, sir,” apologised Dobbs, the gunroom steward, who from his comical little screwed-up eyes and manner must have been first cousin to my old friend the waiter at the “Keppel’s Head,” noticing the disdainful expression with which Tommy Mills continued to glance round the empty table, seeking in vain something appetising in the way of food for his hungry eye to rest upon,—“Beg pardon, sir, but the bumboat woman didn’t come off this morning. Sunday, you know, sir.”“That’s all gammon, steward,” said Master Tommy, still looking about here and there and finding nothing but a desert of empty dishes and dirty plates. “You ought to have sent one of the ship’s boats ashore if you didn’t have enough on board for everybody in the mess. Our steward in theIllustriousalways kept a good look out and sent himself for them when the things were not brought off in time. Why didn’t you do the same?”“I’m sure I’m werry sorry, sir,” answered Dobbs, humbly, awed by the way in which little Tommy spoke to him; for my old comrade, I noticed, had lost none of his cheek since our separation, and now put on the air of a post captain at the least. “Begging y’r pardon, sir, but getting ashore from Spithead, with a northerly wind a-blowin’, ain’t quite so easy as landing from Point and you’re moored over against Blockhouse Fort!”“That may be, but it’s none of my business,” said young Mills, loftily, waiving Dobbs’s plea aside as a mere trivial matter. “I want some breakfast. What have you at all fit for a christian to eat? I see nothing here, nothing at all.”“Got some werry nice cold ’am, sir, in my pantry,” cried Dobbs, with effusion, at this opening, glad of having something he could offer. “Shall I cut you a plate o’ that, sir—just try a wee bit off the knuckle end, sir?”“All right, if there is nothing else, but I suppose it will be all bone and gristle, or as hard as a cat-block,” replied Tommy; heaving a most portentous sigh of disappointment, though winking slily to me to show that he was only ‘putting all this on’ to astonish the other fellows, who were gazing at him with open mouths in wonder at his assurance and grand seigneur manner. “You may get me a couple of eggs, also, while you’re about it, steward. Mind they’re fresh and have no chickens in them; I don’t like poultry in the morning so early!”Of course there was a loud guffaw at this, the three purser’s clerks, who were eating bread and butter at the lower end of the table, not daring to put in a word of objection to the fare, seeming to enjoy the joke mightily.Not so, however, Dobbs.“Werry sorry, sir, but there’s no heggs,” he replied to this somewhat imperative order from Master Tommy, looking absolutely crestfallen at having thus to confess the shortcomings of his commissariat. “The caterer of the mess, sir, forgot to horder ’em, sir.”“No eggs!” cried Tommy, in the tone of tragic denunciation which Cicero might have used when exposing the iniquities of Cataline. “This is really impardonable!”“Never mind, sir,” hastily whispered Dobbs, holding out a gleam of hope, as he thought, “we’ll get some at Plymouth as soon as we anchor in the Sound, sir. You shall get some there, sir, never you fear, sir.”“Plymouth? Why, I may lose the number of my mess myself long before I ever reach there!” said Tommy, contemptuously. “A caterer who forgets to provide eggs for the mess ought to be keel-hauled! Whoisthe caterer, steward?”“Mr Stormcock, sir.”“Oh, indeed! Stormcock, eh?” repeated little Mills, making me choke with suppressed laughter. “Then you can tell Mister Stormcock, with my compliments, that unless he looks after the mess catering better, he’ll precious soon find himself in foul weather with me!”“Highty, tighty, my young bantam!” cried out the gentleman in question, the master’s mate, a thick-set, full-grown fellow, old enough to be Tommy’s father, who happened to be stretched at full length on one of the lockers at the further end of the gunroom, and was roused from his nap on hearing his name mentioned. “You seem to have a pretty considerable stock of impudence of your own for so young a shaver, and crow so loudly you must want to have your comb cut, I think!”“Not to-day, thank you, sir, all the same,” answered Master Tommy, demurely, but with a grimace that made us all laugh. “If I’m a shaver, of course I can cut it myself, can’t I?”“Hang me, but youarea cheeky young beggar, the cheekiest we have on board, I think, and that’s saying a good deal!” ejaculated the other, utterly dumbfounded at his effrontery. “What are you rowing the poor steward about, eh?”“Nothing—only I thought we might have had a better spread for breakfast than I see on the table as we’re not yet at sea, that’s all!”“Oh, that’s all, is it, young gentleman?” cried the master’s mate, not liking to hear his catering criticised so frankly. “I’m sorry you didn’t let us know we had a lord coming aboard; for, if we had heard in time, we’d have hired a French cook and laid in every delicacy you could desire. By jingo! when I was a youngster and joined my ship for the first time, I remember, I was glad enough to get a mouthful of salt junk and hard tack, without any of your bloaters and marmalade and foreign kickshaws—ay, and thought myself doocid lucky, I can tell you, if I didn’t get a thrashing from one of the oldsters in the mess, if I grumbled, to make me relish my grub the better. Things are coming to a pretty pass nowadays for a young jackanapes to growl about his vittles and call his seniors to account!”“Pardon me, sir, but my name is Tom Mills, not ‘Jack Napes,’” said my cheeky chum, with meek subservience; and, turning then to Dobbs, he called out, “a cup of tea, please, steward, with plenty of milk in it.”“Werry sorry, sir, but there ain’t no milk,” replied Dobbs, still more apologetically, at this further demand which he was unable to supply, as if he grieved from his inmost heart thereat. “Mr Jones ’as ’ad the werry last drop, sir.”“We’ll send ashore for a cow for you, Master Impudence,” put in Mr Stormcock, ironically, before Tom could say anything. “Just wait a bit for your breakfast till we can get it off. Dobbs, you know the sort of cow the young gentleman wants—one with an iron tail!”“Did I ever tell you that yarn about a cow we had on board theDuke, eh?” observed a tall gentleman with long whiskers, regular “weepers” of the Dundreary type, who was seated on another locker at the after end of the gunroom, right opposite to the irascible master’s mate. “I mean the cow old Charley Napier took with him in his flagship when we went up the Baltic?”“Good Lord! Jones, don’t get your jaw tacks aboard now,” cried Mr Stormcock, as I pricked up my ears on hearing the name of Sir Charles Napier, Dad’s old captain. “We’ve heard that yarn of yours three times at least since we started fitting out; and, I’m hanged if it’ll stand telling again!”“Oh, very well, then,” said the whiskered gentleman in a displeased tone. He wore a plain undress sort of uniform, I noticed, and Dobbs, the steward, told me he was the paymaster’s assistant and kept the ship’s books; though, he messed in the gunroom with all the midshipmen and cadets, like the master’s mate, both of them seeming to my mind far too old to associate on such a footing with a parcel of boys like ourselves. “I may as well spare my breath to cool my porridge! I assure you, Mr Stormcock, I have no wish to bore you.”“Do tell us about the cow, sir,” I interposed anxiously, afraid he would not continue his story. “I have often heard Dad, I mean my father, speak about Admiral Napier; and, I saw him myself when I was in London last summer. It was he who got me my nomination for a cadetship.”“Ah, then you know what a queer old customer he is?” went on Mr Jones, evidently mollified by the interest I took in his yarn. “It isn’t much of a story, as Mr Stormcock appears to think; but, if you care to hear it, I’ll tell you all about it.”“I do care, sir,” I replied, “very much indeed, sir.”“Well, then, youngster,” he proceeded, “the Baltic fleet was lying at Spithead, where we mustered, you must know, before sailing up the North Sea; and one fine day, when we were about to weigh anchor for the Queen to review us as she passed us in the royal yacht, up comes the dockyard tug alongside, with ‘Sally,’ that was the admiral’s daughter, bringing along with her the old ship’s cow and pigeons and a lot of other stock he had ordered from his place t’other side of Portsdown Hill on the road to Petersfield, ‘Merchiston Hall,’ I think he called it, or some other Scotch name sounding like that.”“Oh, yes,” put in Mr Stormcock, satirically—“I recollect it all quite well. Heave ahead, my hearty!”The assistant-paymaster, however, took no notice whatever of the interruption, pursuing the even tenor of his narrative.“The admiral had the cow and stock taken in; but just as his daughter Sally was coming across the gangway, he ordered her back, for the royal yacht was now coming up. ‘Stop where you are, Sally!’ he shouted out from the poop. ‘Stop, Sally, stop!’ bawling out the words so loudly that you could have heard him in Common Hard, for he had a powerful pair of lungs had Old Charley, and could raise his voice above a gale. Almost in the same breath, too, he sang out to the wives and friends of the sailors who had come out from Portsmouth to wish them good-bye, ‘Now, all you women and people there! go aboard the tug with my darter, and when Her Majesty has passed you may come back again.’ Of course, they all cleared out at once, the master-at-arms and his corporals assisting them over the side; but when they were all comfortably landed on board the tug, she steamed off right away for the harbour, with a long string of wherries and shore boats pulling like blue niggers after her, the men in them swearing like anything at being cheated of their fares. We all the while were getting up anchor and in another minute or two were under weigh. Captain Gordon, who was the admiral’s flag captain, spoke to him about the poor watermen and bumboat women being robbed of their money by our starting so suddenly; but he could get no satisfaction from old Charley. ‘Bumboat women be hanged!’ was all he said. ‘Let ’em take their payment out of the fore tops’l, and the main topgallant s’l shall be witness to the bargain!’ With that, he orders the men, who were muttering to be piped down.”“But the cow, sir,” said I, on the paymaster’s assistant thus coming to a conclusion, without alluding to what I considered the principal point of his story. “You haven’t told us yet about that, sir.”“Oh, yes, I forgot,” said he. “It was a fine beast, I remember, one of the red Alderney breed. Well, this cow was first stowed away in a pen the admiral had rigged up for her on the starboard side of the main deck, forrud; but on the gunner objecting to the mess the animal made there, she was then shifted to the port side, in the middle of the mess deck of the foretopmen. Here, too, she was found such a nuisance that the hands in a very short time determined to get rid of her as quickly as they could, either by fair means or foul; and, of course, they managed this right enough. Let sailors alone for that!”“But, how did they manage it, sir?” asked Tommy Mills, who appeared to take as much interest in the narrative as myself. “Did they kill her, or chuck her overboard?”“They did neither directly; but, indirectly, I may say they did both,” answered Mr Jones, enigmatically, smiling and pulling his long whiskers caressingly through his fingers, as if particularly proud of these hirsute adornments. “The fact was, the unprincipled scoundrels gave her alternately buckets full of dry biscuit-dust and water which so inflated the poor beast that she became the size of a balloon in less than a week; and, if she had not through this been suffocated, she would of course have burst from the ‘abnormal expansion!’ That is how our doctor, old Nettleby, the same we’ve got on board here now, described it to the admiral when he was sent to inspect the cow, when the butcher reported her dead.”“What did the admiral say, sir, when he heard this?”“Oh, he stormed and let fly a volley of picturesque language,” replied Mr Jones to this inquiry of mine; “but what could he do? ‘Throw her out of the bow port,’ he said to the gunner, who pitched a yarn about it being the foretopmen who had done the fell deed. ‘I don’t know whether its your foretopmen or maintop-men that are to be blamed for it, and I don’t care; but, you’ve stopped my milk between you, and I’m hanged if I don’t stop your grog!’”“And did he, sir?” asked little Tom Mills. “Did he stop their grog for it?”“No,” replied Mr Jones. “He was too good-natured an old chap for that.”“More than you were half-an-hour ago,” observed Mr Stormcock, sarcastically, rising up from his recumbent position. “You didn’t think of the fellows coming down from their watch on deck, when you drained off the last remains of the milk, eh? Yes, my joker, you left this cheeky youngster here to go without any in his tea, making him think of home and his mammy! yes, all through your selfishness.”“Now, really, Stormcock,” expostulated the paymaster, “upon my word I didn’t think of that, or I wouldn’t have been so greedy. Really, now, upon my honour!”Just then, the boatswain’s call was heard ringing through the ship, and the drummers began beating to quarters, which made us all jump up.“By jingo, I wonder what’s in the wind now!” exclaimed Mr Stormcock, making a grab at his sword-belt, which he had unfastened for comfort after his breakfast, laying it alongside him on the locker while taking his snooze. “It’s always ‘All hands,’ or ‘Quarters,’ or the ‘Fire Bell,’ or something! I was just thinking of going into my cabin and having a fair lay off the land till noon, for there’s nothing for me to do on deck; when here comes this hanged rattle of the drum, confound it, to upset my caulk. A fellow can’t call his soul his own aboard ship—a sailor’s life’s a dog’s life, by jingo!”
“Well!” exclaimed little Tommy Mills, a little later, when he and I, with young Morgan, the mate and Ned Anstruther, on being relieved by the starboard watch, all went down to the gunroom and sat down to have our breakfast, “I call this a beastly shame.”
“Hullo,” said Popplethorne, one of the other middies, looking up from the plate on which he was busily engaged; while several other fellows, similarly employed ceased operations likewise, staring at Tommy in astonishment. “What’s up?”
“Nothing’s up, but everything seems down,” replied my little chum in an aggrieved tone. “I don’t see a crumb left for a poor, hungry chap; no bloaters, no marmalade, no nothing. When I was in theIllustrious, if they did grind a fellow a bit, one always had something decent to eat, at all events!”
“First come, first served,” mumbled Phil Plumper, the senior mate of our watch, who had his mouth full and was tucking in some species of “burgoo,” or porridge with much gusto. He was an awfully fat fellow and looked just like a boiled lobster bursting out of its shell, for the buttons of his jacket were continually carrying away at odd moments. “If you don’t look out for yourself on board ship you’ll find nobody ’ll look after you; and, you’ll come offminus!”
“That’ll never be your case,” retorted Tommy, with a snigger. “Judging by appearances, I should say your condition represents aplusquantity!”
“Beg pardon, sir,” apologised Dobbs, the gunroom steward, who from his comical little screwed-up eyes and manner must have been first cousin to my old friend the waiter at the “Keppel’s Head,” noticing the disdainful expression with which Tommy Mills continued to glance round the empty table, seeking in vain something appetising in the way of food for his hungry eye to rest upon,—“Beg pardon, sir, but the bumboat woman didn’t come off this morning. Sunday, you know, sir.”
“That’s all gammon, steward,” said Master Tommy, still looking about here and there and finding nothing but a desert of empty dishes and dirty plates. “You ought to have sent one of the ship’s boats ashore if you didn’t have enough on board for everybody in the mess. Our steward in theIllustriousalways kept a good look out and sent himself for them when the things were not brought off in time. Why didn’t you do the same?”
“I’m sure I’m werry sorry, sir,” answered Dobbs, humbly, awed by the way in which little Tommy spoke to him; for my old comrade, I noticed, had lost none of his cheek since our separation, and now put on the air of a post captain at the least. “Begging y’r pardon, sir, but getting ashore from Spithead, with a northerly wind a-blowin’, ain’t quite so easy as landing from Point and you’re moored over against Blockhouse Fort!”
“That may be, but it’s none of my business,” said young Mills, loftily, waiving Dobbs’s plea aside as a mere trivial matter. “I want some breakfast. What have you at all fit for a christian to eat? I see nothing here, nothing at all.”
“Got some werry nice cold ’am, sir, in my pantry,” cried Dobbs, with effusion, at this opening, glad of having something he could offer. “Shall I cut you a plate o’ that, sir—just try a wee bit off the knuckle end, sir?”
“All right, if there is nothing else, but I suppose it will be all bone and gristle, or as hard as a cat-block,” replied Tommy; heaving a most portentous sigh of disappointment, though winking slily to me to show that he was only ‘putting all this on’ to astonish the other fellows, who were gazing at him with open mouths in wonder at his assurance and grand seigneur manner. “You may get me a couple of eggs, also, while you’re about it, steward. Mind they’re fresh and have no chickens in them; I don’t like poultry in the morning so early!”
Of course there was a loud guffaw at this, the three purser’s clerks, who were eating bread and butter at the lower end of the table, not daring to put in a word of objection to the fare, seeming to enjoy the joke mightily.
Not so, however, Dobbs.
“Werry sorry, sir, but there’s no heggs,” he replied to this somewhat imperative order from Master Tommy, looking absolutely crestfallen at having thus to confess the shortcomings of his commissariat. “The caterer of the mess, sir, forgot to horder ’em, sir.”
“No eggs!” cried Tommy, in the tone of tragic denunciation which Cicero might have used when exposing the iniquities of Cataline. “This is really impardonable!”
“Never mind, sir,” hastily whispered Dobbs, holding out a gleam of hope, as he thought, “we’ll get some at Plymouth as soon as we anchor in the Sound, sir. You shall get some there, sir, never you fear, sir.”
“Plymouth? Why, I may lose the number of my mess myself long before I ever reach there!” said Tommy, contemptuously. “A caterer who forgets to provide eggs for the mess ought to be keel-hauled! Whoisthe caterer, steward?”
“Mr Stormcock, sir.”
“Oh, indeed! Stormcock, eh?” repeated little Mills, making me choke with suppressed laughter. “Then you can tell Mister Stormcock, with my compliments, that unless he looks after the mess catering better, he’ll precious soon find himself in foul weather with me!”
“Highty, tighty, my young bantam!” cried out the gentleman in question, the master’s mate, a thick-set, full-grown fellow, old enough to be Tommy’s father, who happened to be stretched at full length on one of the lockers at the further end of the gunroom, and was roused from his nap on hearing his name mentioned. “You seem to have a pretty considerable stock of impudence of your own for so young a shaver, and crow so loudly you must want to have your comb cut, I think!”
“Not to-day, thank you, sir, all the same,” answered Master Tommy, demurely, but with a grimace that made us all laugh. “If I’m a shaver, of course I can cut it myself, can’t I?”
“Hang me, but youarea cheeky young beggar, the cheekiest we have on board, I think, and that’s saying a good deal!” ejaculated the other, utterly dumbfounded at his effrontery. “What are you rowing the poor steward about, eh?”
“Nothing—only I thought we might have had a better spread for breakfast than I see on the table as we’re not yet at sea, that’s all!”
“Oh, that’s all, is it, young gentleman?” cried the master’s mate, not liking to hear his catering criticised so frankly. “I’m sorry you didn’t let us know we had a lord coming aboard; for, if we had heard in time, we’d have hired a French cook and laid in every delicacy you could desire. By jingo! when I was a youngster and joined my ship for the first time, I remember, I was glad enough to get a mouthful of salt junk and hard tack, without any of your bloaters and marmalade and foreign kickshaws—ay, and thought myself doocid lucky, I can tell you, if I didn’t get a thrashing from one of the oldsters in the mess, if I grumbled, to make me relish my grub the better. Things are coming to a pretty pass nowadays for a young jackanapes to growl about his vittles and call his seniors to account!”
“Pardon me, sir, but my name is Tom Mills, not ‘Jack Napes,’” said my cheeky chum, with meek subservience; and, turning then to Dobbs, he called out, “a cup of tea, please, steward, with plenty of milk in it.”
“Werry sorry, sir, but there ain’t no milk,” replied Dobbs, still more apologetically, at this further demand which he was unable to supply, as if he grieved from his inmost heart thereat. “Mr Jones ’as ’ad the werry last drop, sir.”
“We’ll send ashore for a cow for you, Master Impudence,” put in Mr Stormcock, ironically, before Tom could say anything. “Just wait a bit for your breakfast till we can get it off. Dobbs, you know the sort of cow the young gentleman wants—one with an iron tail!”
“Did I ever tell you that yarn about a cow we had on board theDuke, eh?” observed a tall gentleman with long whiskers, regular “weepers” of the Dundreary type, who was seated on another locker at the after end of the gunroom, right opposite to the irascible master’s mate. “I mean the cow old Charley Napier took with him in his flagship when we went up the Baltic?”
“Good Lord! Jones, don’t get your jaw tacks aboard now,” cried Mr Stormcock, as I pricked up my ears on hearing the name of Sir Charles Napier, Dad’s old captain. “We’ve heard that yarn of yours three times at least since we started fitting out; and, I’m hanged if it’ll stand telling again!”
“Oh, very well, then,” said the whiskered gentleman in a displeased tone. He wore a plain undress sort of uniform, I noticed, and Dobbs, the steward, told me he was the paymaster’s assistant and kept the ship’s books; though, he messed in the gunroom with all the midshipmen and cadets, like the master’s mate, both of them seeming to my mind far too old to associate on such a footing with a parcel of boys like ourselves. “I may as well spare my breath to cool my porridge! I assure you, Mr Stormcock, I have no wish to bore you.”
“Do tell us about the cow, sir,” I interposed anxiously, afraid he would not continue his story. “I have often heard Dad, I mean my father, speak about Admiral Napier; and, I saw him myself when I was in London last summer. It was he who got me my nomination for a cadetship.”
“Ah, then you know what a queer old customer he is?” went on Mr Jones, evidently mollified by the interest I took in his yarn. “It isn’t much of a story, as Mr Stormcock appears to think; but, if you care to hear it, I’ll tell you all about it.”
“I do care, sir,” I replied, “very much indeed, sir.”
“Well, then, youngster,” he proceeded, “the Baltic fleet was lying at Spithead, where we mustered, you must know, before sailing up the North Sea; and one fine day, when we were about to weigh anchor for the Queen to review us as she passed us in the royal yacht, up comes the dockyard tug alongside, with ‘Sally,’ that was the admiral’s daughter, bringing along with her the old ship’s cow and pigeons and a lot of other stock he had ordered from his place t’other side of Portsdown Hill on the road to Petersfield, ‘Merchiston Hall,’ I think he called it, or some other Scotch name sounding like that.”
“Oh, yes,” put in Mr Stormcock, satirically—“I recollect it all quite well. Heave ahead, my hearty!”
The assistant-paymaster, however, took no notice whatever of the interruption, pursuing the even tenor of his narrative.
“The admiral had the cow and stock taken in; but just as his daughter Sally was coming across the gangway, he ordered her back, for the royal yacht was now coming up. ‘Stop where you are, Sally!’ he shouted out from the poop. ‘Stop, Sally, stop!’ bawling out the words so loudly that you could have heard him in Common Hard, for he had a powerful pair of lungs had Old Charley, and could raise his voice above a gale. Almost in the same breath, too, he sang out to the wives and friends of the sailors who had come out from Portsmouth to wish them good-bye, ‘Now, all you women and people there! go aboard the tug with my darter, and when Her Majesty has passed you may come back again.’ Of course, they all cleared out at once, the master-at-arms and his corporals assisting them over the side; but when they were all comfortably landed on board the tug, she steamed off right away for the harbour, with a long string of wherries and shore boats pulling like blue niggers after her, the men in them swearing like anything at being cheated of their fares. We all the while were getting up anchor and in another minute or two were under weigh. Captain Gordon, who was the admiral’s flag captain, spoke to him about the poor watermen and bumboat women being robbed of their money by our starting so suddenly; but he could get no satisfaction from old Charley. ‘Bumboat women be hanged!’ was all he said. ‘Let ’em take their payment out of the fore tops’l, and the main topgallant s’l shall be witness to the bargain!’ With that, he orders the men, who were muttering to be piped down.”
“But the cow, sir,” said I, on the paymaster’s assistant thus coming to a conclusion, without alluding to what I considered the principal point of his story. “You haven’t told us yet about that, sir.”
“Oh, yes, I forgot,” said he. “It was a fine beast, I remember, one of the red Alderney breed. Well, this cow was first stowed away in a pen the admiral had rigged up for her on the starboard side of the main deck, forrud; but on the gunner objecting to the mess the animal made there, she was then shifted to the port side, in the middle of the mess deck of the foretopmen. Here, too, she was found such a nuisance that the hands in a very short time determined to get rid of her as quickly as they could, either by fair means or foul; and, of course, they managed this right enough. Let sailors alone for that!”
“But, how did they manage it, sir?” asked Tommy Mills, who appeared to take as much interest in the narrative as myself. “Did they kill her, or chuck her overboard?”
“They did neither directly; but, indirectly, I may say they did both,” answered Mr Jones, enigmatically, smiling and pulling his long whiskers caressingly through his fingers, as if particularly proud of these hirsute adornments. “The fact was, the unprincipled scoundrels gave her alternately buckets full of dry biscuit-dust and water which so inflated the poor beast that she became the size of a balloon in less than a week; and, if she had not through this been suffocated, she would of course have burst from the ‘abnormal expansion!’ That is how our doctor, old Nettleby, the same we’ve got on board here now, described it to the admiral when he was sent to inspect the cow, when the butcher reported her dead.”
“What did the admiral say, sir, when he heard this?”
“Oh, he stormed and let fly a volley of picturesque language,” replied Mr Jones to this inquiry of mine; “but what could he do? ‘Throw her out of the bow port,’ he said to the gunner, who pitched a yarn about it being the foretopmen who had done the fell deed. ‘I don’t know whether its your foretopmen or maintop-men that are to be blamed for it, and I don’t care; but, you’ve stopped my milk between you, and I’m hanged if I don’t stop your grog!’”
“And did he, sir?” asked little Tom Mills. “Did he stop their grog for it?”
“No,” replied Mr Jones. “He was too good-natured an old chap for that.”
“More than you were half-an-hour ago,” observed Mr Stormcock, sarcastically, rising up from his recumbent position. “You didn’t think of the fellows coming down from their watch on deck, when you drained off the last remains of the milk, eh? Yes, my joker, you left this cheeky youngster here to go without any in his tea, making him think of home and his mammy! yes, all through your selfishness.”
“Now, really, Stormcock,” expostulated the paymaster, “upon my word I didn’t think of that, or I wouldn’t have been so greedy. Really, now, upon my honour!”
Just then, the boatswain’s call was heard ringing through the ship, and the drummers began beating to quarters, which made us all jump up.
“By jingo, I wonder what’s in the wind now!” exclaimed Mr Stormcock, making a grab at his sword-belt, which he had unfastened for comfort after his breakfast, laying it alongside him on the locker while taking his snooze. “It’s always ‘All hands,’ or ‘Quarters,’ or the ‘Fire Bell,’ or something! I was just thinking of going into my cabin and having a fair lay off the land till noon, for there’s nothing for me to do on deck; when here comes this hanged rattle of the drum, confound it, to upset my caulk. A fellow can’t call his soul his own aboard ship—a sailor’s life’s a dog’s life, by jingo!”
Chapter Thirteen.The Chaplain makes a Mistake, and we make Sail.“Ah! my little friend, here you are, I see, in your proper place,” said Commander Nesbitt kindly to me, on my ranging myself by his side on the poop, where he was standing with the captain; for, being his special messenger, or aide-de-camp, so to speak, although it was not really my watch on deck again till late in the afternoon, I thought on hearing the drummer beat to quarters that I ought to go to him at once. “Every man to his station is the rule on board ship. That is only how order and discipline can be carried out with such a large company to deal with!”I could see, too, that this rule was observed to the very letter, for the first lieutenant was already on the forecastle, eyeglass in eye, of course, as usual; while Mr Bitpin was on the quarter-deck, just below the break of the poop; and “Joe” Jellaby on the main deck, close to the hatchway, so as to be within easy hail.Mr Cheffinch, the gunnery lieutenant, and Charley Gilham, in their turn, were on the lower deck, looking after things there, with all the mates and midshipmen and cadets, each at his allotted post and everyone equipped with sword or dirk buckled on ready for instant action.Mr Triggs, the gunner, likewise had taken the keys of the magazine from their proper resting-place when not wanted for use, just without the door of the captain’s cabin, where a sentry always stood guard over them; and was now prepared with all his staff of “powder-monkeys” to send up whatever ammunition might be required at a moment’s notice.The carpenter, too, stood by the pumps, and Dr Nettleby, with Mr Macgilpin and Mr Leech, the two assistant-surgeons, had all the contents of their surgical cases—most murderous-looking instruments they were, too—spread out on the wardroom and gunroom tables, as well as plenty of lint and bandages for dressing; while Corporal Macan, with a working party of marines, were told off to act as stretcher bearers, and supply hospital aid to the imaginary wounded.The remainder of the “jollies” were drawn up in martial array on the after part of the poop, under the command of Captain Targetts and Lieutenants Wagstaff and Shunter of the same serviceable corps; all of the men spick and span in their full regimentals and appearing as smart as if on the parade ground at Forton; although, but a few minutes previously, most of the poor fellows had been washing plates and mess traps, and performing other menial duties below.Young as I was, I could not help observing all this, and noting, as the commander had pointed out to me, how, thanks to a rigid discipline and the inexorable regularity, almost like that of a machine, with which the routine of duty is conducted on board a man-of-war, every officer and man, from the captain down to the smallest “powder-monkey,” was in his proper place and at his station before the rat-tat-tat of the drum had ceased reverberating fore and aft; albeit, most of the hands had only recently joined the ship, while some, indeed, had never before been to sea.Of course, there was a good deal of scurrying to and fro and apparent confusion whilst the men were getting to their stations, the hasty trampling of feet along the decks and the scrambling up of hatchways, some snatching their rifles from the arm racks and belting on their cutlasses as they hurried by, slinging their cartridge pouches over their shoulders at the run; and, meanwhile, Commander Nesbitt, with my insignificant self by his side, remained at the end of the poop-rail, taking in everything that went on with his quick-glancing, watchful eye, waiting quietly till all the preparations were complete.“Bosun’s mate!” he sang out when all were ready. “Pipe the hands to secure the guns for sea!”This was a sad come down from all the grand things which some new to the game expected; but, as we all learnt within a very short time of our novitiate, life at sea is a series of surprises, and, if the ruling maxim be “To hear is to obey,” carried out with Draconian severity to the extreme letter of the law, the beauty of it lies in the fact that you never know what youaregoing to hear until you actually hear it.The captain, is, it must be remembered, a sort of Delphic oracle of the marine genus, who invariably keeps his mystic intentions locked within the secret recesses of his own breast and only gives them utterance, when the occasion arrives for him to speak, through the lips of his chief augur, the commander.None of “the profane vulgar,” in the shape of the ship’s company, know what will be the next move on the board until he gives the inspired word; although, if unguessed until finally uttered, it is generally short, sharp and to the point!That word being now given, needless to add, it was immediately acted upon.The breechings of the guns on each deck were bowsed up and the side tackle falls hove taut and frapped, with preventer tackles rigged and secured round the brackets at the after part of the carriages and hooked to the ring-bolts in the ship’s side; all the guns’ crews assisting in this task, and the marines and idlers tailing on to the falls and hauling away at the sound of the boatswain’s pipe and only stopping pulling at the order being given “Avast heaving!”When passing round with the commander presently to see if all the guns had been properly made fast, so that there should be no chance of their “taking charge” in a heavy seaway and running themselves out without leave or licence when we least expected it, I overheard “Joe” Jellaby talking to Charley Gilham, who had now come up from the lower deck and was standing by the main hatchway.“I say, Charley,” observed Mr Jellaby, “have you seen our ‘sky pilot’ yet?”“No, ‘Joe,’” replied the other. “He didn’t come into the wardroom till after dinner, and I had to go on deck for the first watch, and so didn’t see him.”“Well, he’s the greenest chaplain I ever saw on board ship before,” went on “Joe,” with a chuckle of merriment. “He’s been dodging in and out of his cabin since One Bell sounded, with all his pulpit rig on, as if he didn’t know what exactly to do with himself and was afraid to ask anyone.”“Perhaps he thought the bell rang for church,” suggested Mr Gilham. “One of the fellows told me the parson has never been to sea before; so, my boy, of course, he doesn’t know he’s got to wait till the cap’en gives the order for service to be held. Those shore Johnnies have got a lot to be knocked into them! He doesn’t know Farmer as we do, or he’d fight shy of taking a liberty with him!”“Fancy, though, his skylarking round, in all his war paint,” said “Joe,” breaking into his jovial laugh, which always made me join in for sympathy. “I shouldn’t wonder if he belonged to what they call the church militant; and on hearing the drummer beat to quarters, he naturally thought he ought to be prepared with his spiritual weapons as we were buckling on our arms, eh? By Jove, there he is now coming out of the wardroom right up to us! I say, Charley, stand by me, like a good chap.”But, Mr Gilham, thought in this instance that “discretion was the better part of valour,” for he gave poor “Joe” the slip by incontinently bolting up the hatchway, leaving his comrade to encounter alone the chaplain, who the next moment, in full canonicals, surplice and hood and cassock and all, confronted him.He was a slim, sandy-coloured gentleman, I noticed, with hair of the tint of tow. He had also white eyelashes, and spoke in a thin, hesitating voice, with a timid manner, as if very nervous and uncertain of his footing.“A–hem,” he began, with a slight affected cough of introduction. “I be—believe I’m addressing Mr —?”“Jellaby is my name, sir,” said the lieutenant, filling up the hiatus in his speech and bowing politely. “Joe Jellaby, at your service. Is there anything I can do for you, Mr —?”“Smythe, sir, is my name,” replied the other. “I am the ah—chaplain.”“So I see, sir,” said Joe, drily, glancing at his canonicals. “Glad to have the pleasure of making your acquaintance, Mr Smith.”“‘Smythe,’ that is ‘Smith’ with a final ‘e,’ if you please,” corrected the reverend gentleman in a plaintive tone. “My name is not ‘Smith,’ Mr Jellyboy.”“Nor is mine Jellyboy, Mr Smythe,” retorted “Joe,” laughing outright at the comical situation. “We’ve both made a mistake, Mr Smythe; and I apologise for mine. But, is there anything I can do for you, sir?”“Well,” hesitated the other, “I want, you know, to hold a service, you know—ah, and—”“You’ll have to ask the captain after divisions, sir,” put in “Joe” anxious to close the interview, for the drums had begun to beat the Retreat for the men to return their arms. “Excuse me, though, please, Mr Smythe, I’ve got to go on deck now.”With that he vanished up the hatchway after Mr Gilham; and, thereupon the unhappy Mr Smythe found himself, with his “final e,” in the midst of a seething mass of men racing along the deck to put their rifles and cutlasses back in the racks, being finally compelled to beat a retreat himself to the wardroom, while the boatswain and his mates were piping and shouting all over the ship for the hands to clean themselves and dress for “Divisions.”A quarter-of-an-hour later, both watches were mustered, all decently dressed, like “Sally in our Alley,” in their Sunday best, according to their respective stations; the first and second divisions on the upper deck and forecastle, under the first lieutenant and Mr Jellaby; the third and fourth divisions on the main deck, with Mr Gilham and Mr Bitpin at the head of the men; and the fifth and sixth on the lower deck, in charge of “Gunnery Jack,” in lieu of one of the regular lieutenants, and the second mate, the fat Plumper, bursting out of his buttons as usual, who was at the head of the after-guard, among whom I recognised the ex-gravedigger, “Downy.”This worthy, I noticed, looked quite smart and seaman-like in the dungaree suit he had purchased from Mrs Poll Nash, the bumboat woman, which his messmates had taught him to rig up in proper man-o’-war fashion, the good-hearted chaps also supplying whatever other necessaries were required for his wardrobe, such as the black silk handkerchief, tied in a loose knot round his neck, and the knife and lanyard without which no bluejacket’s toilet is complete.The men were drawn up in line, two deep, in open order, ready for inspection, and the captain and commander were just about descending from the poop to go round the ranks; when, up came the Reverend Mr Smythe on the quarter-deck in his complete clerical regalia, only now with his college cap on, which, when I had seen him before by the main hatchway, he had carried in his hand.He now raised this in salute to the captain and then immediately replaced it, seeing that none of us were uncovered, all of us having our caps on of course, being in uniform.Captain Farmer only gave the regulation touch to the peak of his in return for the chaplain’s courtesy.“Well, sir,” said Captain Farmer in his direct way, as Mr Smythe struggled to speak, feeling that the eyes of all hands were upon him, blushing a rosy red up to the roots of his sandy hair, “what is it?”“Am I—ah—to begin now, sir,” he stammered; “or, wa—wa—wait till the bell rings again, sir?”“Bell rings!” repeated the captain, abruptly. “For what, sir?”“For service, sir.”“Service?” said Captain Farmer, in a questioning tone still. “I’ve given no orders about any service to-day. There’s no time for it now. We’re going to weigh anchor in another minute or two.”“Weigh the anchor, sir!” exclaimed Mr Smythe, in a voice of holy indignation, losing all his hesitancy and awkwardness of speech. “Why, it is Sunday!”“The better the day, the better the deed,” rejoined the captain, rather sternly, I thought. “If you overhaul your Bible you’ll find it was only the Pharisees who objected to any necessary work being done on the Sabbath, and I myself see nothing wrong in our sailing on this day if we have a fair wind, Sunday though it be; besides which, I am obeying the orders of my queen and country.”“But, sir,” cried Mr Smythe, flushing up again, though now more from the heat of argument than from the feeling of bashfulness which at first oppressed him, “it is my duty to celebrate divine service, and my bishop—”“Mr Smythe, I’m bishop here; and, as commanding officer, my word is law,” interrupted Captain Farmer. “The next time you may desire to hold service on board this ship, please be good enough to ask my permission first; for, remember, my rule is paramount here over matters spiritual as well as things temporal. No doubt you have erred through ignorance in trying to set your authority against mine, and I’ll not dwell further on the matter. I am sorry there’ll be no time to-day for you to hold any regular service, for I am now going to inspect the men at divisions; but, after that, you may have a short prayer, if you like, before we make sail.”The Reverend Mr Smythe, I was glad to notice, took this rebuke in dignified silence, standing aside on the quarter-deck while the captain and commander descended the poop-ladder and went their rounds.He waited until they had passed forwards before he went down the after-hatchway to the main deck; where, on the completion of the inspection, all hands were mustered and he read the form of prayer enjoined by the rubric for those about to travel by sea, which was listened to more attentively perhaps than it is in any church ashore.Sailors, however, watch as well as pray; so, no sooner had the chaplain finished than his congregation dispersed instantly to their stations, the commander singing out from the poop, the moment he had reached that coign of vantage, the long-delayed but welcome order, for which we had all been waiting in expectancy since the morning.“Hands, up anchor!” he cried in a brave shout, to which the boatswain on the forecastle gave a shrill response with his whistle, while his mates re-echoed the cry between decks, up and down the ship fore and aft, “All hands, up anchor!”The capstan was again manned below, and the marines and idlers heaved in the cable to the sound of the drum and fife, as before; although, this time, the tune was “The Girl I Left Behind Me,” the tramp of their feet coming in every now and again as a sort of chorus to the music, while on the forecastle above, the boatswain overhauled the catfalls, and got up the up and down tackle, and the gunner’s crew rigged out the fish davit with its gear.“The cable’s ‘up and down,’ sir,” presently reported the boatswain to “glass-eye,” our first lieutenant, who passed the word aft in the usual manner to the commander on the poop. “Cable’s up and down, sir!”The merry sound of the drum and fife, and steady tramp of the men round the capstan on the main deck continued until, anon, the boatswain once again reported to the Honourable Digby Lanyard, as he stood surveying the progress made in heaving in from the knight heads, “Anchor’s weighed, sir.”This implied that the heavy mass of metal, of some four tons weight, by which we had been moored, was now off the ground, a fact that increased the strain on the cable and messenger, taking a longer and a stronger pull out of those working the capstan, and making the nippers, too, pass a trifle less briskly than before.“Anchor’s in sight, sir, and a clear anchor, too!” was the next cry from the forecastle that went from hand to hand aft, causing ‘The Girl I Left Behind Me’ to come out stronger than previously and the tramping feet to hasten their measured tread; and, in another minute or so, the ring of the anchor was chock up to the hawse pipe at the bows, and the boatswain piped “Belay!”“Hands make sail!” next came from the commander aft, the midshipmen stationed in the tops jumping into the rigging and scrambling up the ratlines before he could shout “Way aloft!”In an instant, up started the topmen in pursuit, as it seemed, of the middies in a sort of ‘follow my leader’ chase; and ere the vibration of the commander’s voice had ceased to tremble in the air, the active fellows were spread out along the footropes of the yards, loosing the lanyards of the gaskets and casting them off, while the deck-men let go the buntlines and clewlines and other running gear.“All ready for letting fall, sir,” the middy stationed in the foretop was the first to sing out. This was Dick Popplethorne, a smart lad, who prompted the topmen under his charge to emulate his ready example, so as to get ahead of the others. Larkyns at the maintop was a good second, while Adams at the mizzen was the last; the officer of the watch, on hearing his hail, reporting “All ready!”“Let fall and sheet home!” thereupon shouted out Commander Nesbitt, with the captain standing behind, as it were, to “back him up,” following this order with another warning hail—“Topsail halliards!”Our topsails and courses were at once spread; and, then, the men on deck stood by the halliards, hoisting the yards up as soon as the word of command reached them from the commander with his next breath “Hoist away!”The wind was blowing steadily from the northward and westward as the yards were braced up, and theCandaharpayed off handsomely on the port tack with the tide, making for the Warner Lightship to the eastwards; and, as we trimmed sails and bore away from our whilom anchorage in the roadstead, the breeze brought out to us the silvery chimes of the bells of old Saint Thomas’, ringing the good people to church while we stood out to sea.There was a clear blue sky overhead and the bright sun mellowed the frosty feel of the air, lighting up the blue water around us, as we ploughed our way through the dancing wavelets; our noble ship curvetting and prancing along, similar to some gallant charger tossing its head and showing off its paces, throwing up the spray over her forecastle when she dipped deeper than usual and leaving a long wake behind her, like a lady’s fan, all sprinkled over with pearls, stretching back to Spithead, now far away astern.
“Ah! my little friend, here you are, I see, in your proper place,” said Commander Nesbitt kindly to me, on my ranging myself by his side on the poop, where he was standing with the captain; for, being his special messenger, or aide-de-camp, so to speak, although it was not really my watch on deck again till late in the afternoon, I thought on hearing the drummer beat to quarters that I ought to go to him at once. “Every man to his station is the rule on board ship. That is only how order and discipline can be carried out with such a large company to deal with!”
I could see, too, that this rule was observed to the very letter, for the first lieutenant was already on the forecastle, eyeglass in eye, of course, as usual; while Mr Bitpin was on the quarter-deck, just below the break of the poop; and “Joe” Jellaby on the main deck, close to the hatchway, so as to be within easy hail.
Mr Cheffinch, the gunnery lieutenant, and Charley Gilham, in their turn, were on the lower deck, looking after things there, with all the mates and midshipmen and cadets, each at his allotted post and everyone equipped with sword or dirk buckled on ready for instant action.
Mr Triggs, the gunner, likewise had taken the keys of the magazine from their proper resting-place when not wanted for use, just without the door of the captain’s cabin, where a sentry always stood guard over them; and was now prepared with all his staff of “powder-monkeys” to send up whatever ammunition might be required at a moment’s notice.
The carpenter, too, stood by the pumps, and Dr Nettleby, with Mr Macgilpin and Mr Leech, the two assistant-surgeons, had all the contents of their surgical cases—most murderous-looking instruments they were, too—spread out on the wardroom and gunroom tables, as well as plenty of lint and bandages for dressing; while Corporal Macan, with a working party of marines, were told off to act as stretcher bearers, and supply hospital aid to the imaginary wounded.
The remainder of the “jollies” were drawn up in martial array on the after part of the poop, under the command of Captain Targetts and Lieutenants Wagstaff and Shunter of the same serviceable corps; all of the men spick and span in their full regimentals and appearing as smart as if on the parade ground at Forton; although, but a few minutes previously, most of the poor fellows had been washing plates and mess traps, and performing other menial duties below.
Young as I was, I could not help observing all this, and noting, as the commander had pointed out to me, how, thanks to a rigid discipline and the inexorable regularity, almost like that of a machine, with which the routine of duty is conducted on board a man-of-war, every officer and man, from the captain down to the smallest “powder-monkey,” was in his proper place and at his station before the rat-tat-tat of the drum had ceased reverberating fore and aft; albeit, most of the hands had only recently joined the ship, while some, indeed, had never before been to sea.
Of course, there was a good deal of scurrying to and fro and apparent confusion whilst the men were getting to their stations, the hasty trampling of feet along the decks and the scrambling up of hatchways, some snatching their rifles from the arm racks and belting on their cutlasses as they hurried by, slinging their cartridge pouches over their shoulders at the run; and, meanwhile, Commander Nesbitt, with my insignificant self by his side, remained at the end of the poop-rail, taking in everything that went on with his quick-glancing, watchful eye, waiting quietly till all the preparations were complete.
“Bosun’s mate!” he sang out when all were ready. “Pipe the hands to secure the guns for sea!”
This was a sad come down from all the grand things which some new to the game expected; but, as we all learnt within a very short time of our novitiate, life at sea is a series of surprises, and, if the ruling maxim be “To hear is to obey,” carried out with Draconian severity to the extreme letter of the law, the beauty of it lies in the fact that you never know what youaregoing to hear until you actually hear it.
The captain, is, it must be remembered, a sort of Delphic oracle of the marine genus, who invariably keeps his mystic intentions locked within the secret recesses of his own breast and only gives them utterance, when the occasion arrives for him to speak, through the lips of his chief augur, the commander.
None of “the profane vulgar,” in the shape of the ship’s company, know what will be the next move on the board until he gives the inspired word; although, if unguessed until finally uttered, it is generally short, sharp and to the point!
That word being now given, needless to add, it was immediately acted upon.
The breechings of the guns on each deck were bowsed up and the side tackle falls hove taut and frapped, with preventer tackles rigged and secured round the brackets at the after part of the carriages and hooked to the ring-bolts in the ship’s side; all the guns’ crews assisting in this task, and the marines and idlers tailing on to the falls and hauling away at the sound of the boatswain’s pipe and only stopping pulling at the order being given “Avast heaving!”
When passing round with the commander presently to see if all the guns had been properly made fast, so that there should be no chance of their “taking charge” in a heavy seaway and running themselves out without leave or licence when we least expected it, I overheard “Joe” Jellaby talking to Charley Gilham, who had now come up from the lower deck and was standing by the main hatchway.
“I say, Charley,” observed Mr Jellaby, “have you seen our ‘sky pilot’ yet?”
“No, ‘Joe,’” replied the other. “He didn’t come into the wardroom till after dinner, and I had to go on deck for the first watch, and so didn’t see him.”
“Well, he’s the greenest chaplain I ever saw on board ship before,” went on “Joe,” with a chuckle of merriment. “He’s been dodging in and out of his cabin since One Bell sounded, with all his pulpit rig on, as if he didn’t know what exactly to do with himself and was afraid to ask anyone.”
“Perhaps he thought the bell rang for church,” suggested Mr Gilham. “One of the fellows told me the parson has never been to sea before; so, my boy, of course, he doesn’t know he’s got to wait till the cap’en gives the order for service to be held. Those shore Johnnies have got a lot to be knocked into them! He doesn’t know Farmer as we do, or he’d fight shy of taking a liberty with him!”
“Fancy, though, his skylarking round, in all his war paint,” said “Joe,” breaking into his jovial laugh, which always made me join in for sympathy. “I shouldn’t wonder if he belonged to what they call the church militant; and on hearing the drummer beat to quarters, he naturally thought he ought to be prepared with his spiritual weapons as we were buckling on our arms, eh? By Jove, there he is now coming out of the wardroom right up to us! I say, Charley, stand by me, like a good chap.”
But, Mr Gilham, thought in this instance that “discretion was the better part of valour,” for he gave poor “Joe” the slip by incontinently bolting up the hatchway, leaving his comrade to encounter alone the chaplain, who the next moment, in full canonicals, surplice and hood and cassock and all, confronted him.
He was a slim, sandy-coloured gentleman, I noticed, with hair of the tint of tow. He had also white eyelashes, and spoke in a thin, hesitating voice, with a timid manner, as if very nervous and uncertain of his footing.
“A–hem,” he began, with a slight affected cough of introduction. “I be—believe I’m addressing Mr —?”
“Jellaby is my name, sir,” said the lieutenant, filling up the hiatus in his speech and bowing politely. “Joe Jellaby, at your service. Is there anything I can do for you, Mr —?”
“Smythe, sir, is my name,” replied the other. “I am the ah—chaplain.”
“So I see, sir,” said Joe, drily, glancing at his canonicals. “Glad to have the pleasure of making your acquaintance, Mr Smith.”
“‘Smythe,’ that is ‘Smith’ with a final ‘e,’ if you please,” corrected the reverend gentleman in a plaintive tone. “My name is not ‘Smith,’ Mr Jellyboy.”
“Nor is mine Jellyboy, Mr Smythe,” retorted “Joe,” laughing outright at the comical situation. “We’ve both made a mistake, Mr Smythe; and I apologise for mine. But, is there anything I can do for you, sir?”
“Well,” hesitated the other, “I want, you know, to hold a service, you know—ah, and—”
“You’ll have to ask the captain after divisions, sir,” put in “Joe” anxious to close the interview, for the drums had begun to beat the Retreat for the men to return their arms. “Excuse me, though, please, Mr Smythe, I’ve got to go on deck now.”
With that he vanished up the hatchway after Mr Gilham; and, thereupon the unhappy Mr Smythe found himself, with his “final e,” in the midst of a seething mass of men racing along the deck to put their rifles and cutlasses back in the racks, being finally compelled to beat a retreat himself to the wardroom, while the boatswain and his mates were piping and shouting all over the ship for the hands to clean themselves and dress for “Divisions.”
A quarter-of-an-hour later, both watches were mustered, all decently dressed, like “Sally in our Alley,” in their Sunday best, according to their respective stations; the first and second divisions on the upper deck and forecastle, under the first lieutenant and Mr Jellaby; the third and fourth divisions on the main deck, with Mr Gilham and Mr Bitpin at the head of the men; and the fifth and sixth on the lower deck, in charge of “Gunnery Jack,” in lieu of one of the regular lieutenants, and the second mate, the fat Plumper, bursting out of his buttons as usual, who was at the head of the after-guard, among whom I recognised the ex-gravedigger, “Downy.”
This worthy, I noticed, looked quite smart and seaman-like in the dungaree suit he had purchased from Mrs Poll Nash, the bumboat woman, which his messmates had taught him to rig up in proper man-o’-war fashion, the good-hearted chaps also supplying whatever other necessaries were required for his wardrobe, such as the black silk handkerchief, tied in a loose knot round his neck, and the knife and lanyard without which no bluejacket’s toilet is complete.
The men were drawn up in line, two deep, in open order, ready for inspection, and the captain and commander were just about descending from the poop to go round the ranks; when, up came the Reverend Mr Smythe on the quarter-deck in his complete clerical regalia, only now with his college cap on, which, when I had seen him before by the main hatchway, he had carried in his hand.
He now raised this in salute to the captain and then immediately replaced it, seeing that none of us were uncovered, all of us having our caps on of course, being in uniform.
Captain Farmer only gave the regulation touch to the peak of his in return for the chaplain’s courtesy.
“Well, sir,” said Captain Farmer in his direct way, as Mr Smythe struggled to speak, feeling that the eyes of all hands were upon him, blushing a rosy red up to the roots of his sandy hair, “what is it?”
“Am I—ah—to begin now, sir,” he stammered; “or, wa—wa—wait till the bell rings again, sir?”
“Bell rings!” repeated the captain, abruptly. “For what, sir?”
“For service, sir.”
“Service?” said Captain Farmer, in a questioning tone still. “I’ve given no orders about any service to-day. There’s no time for it now. We’re going to weigh anchor in another minute or two.”
“Weigh the anchor, sir!” exclaimed Mr Smythe, in a voice of holy indignation, losing all his hesitancy and awkwardness of speech. “Why, it is Sunday!”
“The better the day, the better the deed,” rejoined the captain, rather sternly, I thought. “If you overhaul your Bible you’ll find it was only the Pharisees who objected to any necessary work being done on the Sabbath, and I myself see nothing wrong in our sailing on this day if we have a fair wind, Sunday though it be; besides which, I am obeying the orders of my queen and country.”
“But, sir,” cried Mr Smythe, flushing up again, though now more from the heat of argument than from the feeling of bashfulness which at first oppressed him, “it is my duty to celebrate divine service, and my bishop—”
“Mr Smythe, I’m bishop here; and, as commanding officer, my word is law,” interrupted Captain Farmer. “The next time you may desire to hold service on board this ship, please be good enough to ask my permission first; for, remember, my rule is paramount here over matters spiritual as well as things temporal. No doubt you have erred through ignorance in trying to set your authority against mine, and I’ll not dwell further on the matter. I am sorry there’ll be no time to-day for you to hold any regular service, for I am now going to inspect the men at divisions; but, after that, you may have a short prayer, if you like, before we make sail.”
The Reverend Mr Smythe, I was glad to notice, took this rebuke in dignified silence, standing aside on the quarter-deck while the captain and commander descended the poop-ladder and went their rounds.
He waited until they had passed forwards before he went down the after-hatchway to the main deck; where, on the completion of the inspection, all hands were mustered and he read the form of prayer enjoined by the rubric for those about to travel by sea, which was listened to more attentively perhaps than it is in any church ashore.
Sailors, however, watch as well as pray; so, no sooner had the chaplain finished than his congregation dispersed instantly to their stations, the commander singing out from the poop, the moment he had reached that coign of vantage, the long-delayed but welcome order, for which we had all been waiting in expectancy since the morning.
“Hands, up anchor!” he cried in a brave shout, to which the boatswain on the forecastle gave a shrill response with his whistle, while his mates re-echoed the cry between decks, up and down the ship fore and aft, “All hands, up anchor!”
The capstan was again manned below, and the marines and idlers heaved in the cable to the sound of the drum and fife, as before; although, this time, the tune was “The Girl I Left Behind Me,” the tramp of their feet coming in every now and again as a sort of chorus to the music, while on the forecastle above, the boatswain overhauled the catfalls, and got up the up and down tackle, and the gunner’s crew rigged out the fish davit with its gear.
“The cable’s ‘up and down,’ sir,” presently reported the boatswain to “glass-eye,” our first lieutenant, who passed the word aft in the usual manner to the commander on the poop. “Cable’s up and down, sir!”
The merry sound of the drum and fife, and steady tramp of the men round the capstan on the main deck continued until, anon, the boatswain once again reported to the Honourable Digby Lanyard, as he stood surveying the progress made in heaving in from the knight heads, “Anchor’s weighed, sir.”
This implied that the heavy mass of metal, of some four tons weight, by which we had been moored, was now off the ground, a fact that increased the strain on the cable and messenger, taking a longer and a stronger pull out of those working the capstan, and making the nippers, too, pass a trifle less briskly than before.
“Anchor’s in sight, sir, and a clear anchor, too!” was the next cry from the forecastle that went from hand to hand aft, causing ‘The Girl I Left Behind Me’ to come out stronger than previously and the tramping feet to hasten their measured tread; and, in another minute or so, the ring of the anchor was chock up to the hawse pipe at the bows, and the boatswain piped “Belay!”
“Hands make sail!” next came from the commander aft, the midshipmen stationed in the tops jumping into the rigging and scrambling up the ratlines before he could shout “Way aloft!”
In an instant, up started the topmen in pursuit, as it seemed, of the middies in a sort of ‘follow my leader’ chase; and ere the vibration of the commander’s voice had ceased to tremble in the air, the active fellows were spread out along the footropes of the yards, loosing the lanyards of the gaskets and casting them off, while the deck-men let go the buntlines and clewlines and other running gear.
“All ready for letting fall, sir,” the middy stationed in the foretop was the first to sing out. This was Dick Popplethorne, a smart lad, who prompted the topmen under his charge to emulate his ready example, so as to get ahead of the others. Larkyns at the maintop was a good second, while Adams at the mizzen was the last; the officer of the watch, on hearing his hail, reporting “All ready!”
“Let fall and sheet home!” thereupon shouted out Commander Nesbitt, with the captain standing behind, as it were, to “back him up,” following this order with another warning hail—“Topsail halliards!”
Our topsails and courses were at once spread; and, then, the men on deck stood by the halliards, hoisting the yards up as soon as the word of command reached them from the commander with his next breath “Hoist away!”
The wind was blowing steadily from the northward and westward as the yards were braced up, and theCandaharpayed off handsomely on the port tack with the tide, making for the Warner Lightship to the eastwards; and, as we trimmed sails and bore away from our whilom anchorage in the roadstead, the breeze brought out to us the silvery chimes of the bells of old Saint Thomas’, ringing the good people to church while we stood out to sea.
There was a clear blue sky overhead and the bright sun mellowed the frosty feel of the air, lighting up the blue water around us, as we ploughed our way through the dancing wavelets; our noble ship curvetting and prancing along, similar to some gallant charger tossing its head and showing off its paces, throwing up the spray over her forecastle when she dipped deeper than usual and leaving a long wake behind her, like a lady’s fan, all sprinkled over with pearls, stretching back to Spithead, now far away astern.