Chapter Seven.

Chapter Seven.I ‘Go Aloft,’ like my Ancestor!“Tom,” said Mick to me, on my telling him this, when we were dismissed anon from instruction drill and were going up on the upper deck during the ‘break-off,’ for a brief breath of fresh air before proceeding below again to our tea, “wer that theer yarn thrue, sure, ye wos afther tellin’ me?”He spoke earnestly, and I replied to him in the same tone. “It’s true enough, Mick, that one of our officers did manage to parbuckle a gun up to the top of a high rock, or, rather, mountain, which commanded the land defences of Castries, the principal town of Saint Lucia in the West Indies! I’ve heard father speak about it many a time,” said I. “But, ’pon my word, Mick, I can’t precisely recollect if it was the gallant Rodney or Sir Ralph Abercromby; for both of ’em were busy in those parts at the time, and pretty well made their mark too! All I can say is, though, that through this dodge they took the Frenchies unawares and gave them a dressing as British sailors have always done when we’ve been at loggerheads with them furrin chaps!”Mick Donovan scratched his head, in the same solemn way father used to do, as if trying to rub in this valuable piece of historical information.“Faith,” said he, “I can’t underconstubble it at all, at all!”There our conversation came to an abrupt close; the bugle summoning us to supper, and Mick being extremely particular, I found, never to be late at meal-times if he could possibly help it!The next morning, after the usual routine of lashing up and stowing our hammocks in the nettings, on the completion of our breakfast, it was the turn of the second division of the starboard watch, to which we belonged, as I have already detailed, to go to school in the big room on the lower deck aft, where we had passed our original initiatory examination before signing our papers.The boys were given very fair play in respect of their nautical education, taking each department of their instruction turn and turn about in regular order.For instance, if the port watch attended school from Three Bells to Seven Bells in the forenoon—that is, in shore time, from half-past nine to half-past eleven o’clock in the morning—the starboard watch would be engaged in seamanship or gunnery instruction; while, in the afternoon their respective avocations would be reversed, the ‘starbowlines’ going to their books, and the port watch occupying themselves with the other drills.This day, as I have said, we went to school after inspection and prayers by the chaplain on the upper deck, which, I should have mentioned, was the usual routine every morning when breakfast was finished and the mess-tables and decks below swept clean and made tidy.I remember one of the schoolmasters impressed me very much during a geography lesson, by showing us on the globe how extensive our national possessions were, and how it became us as British sailors to maintain our rights on every land and sea where the Union Jack of Old England had ever once floated.I declare I can recollect his very words.“The sun, my boys,” he said very impressively, “never sets on Her Majesty’s dominions!”When school was over, and the bugle, that ever-sounding bugle, rang out the call for ‘divisions’ presently, we all bustled up, of course, to the upper deck, and, whether it was from the schoolmaster’s observation or what, I’m sure I can’t say, I was struck by the wonderful lot of fine fellows we had on board the training-ship: all wearing the same smart bluejacket uniform, men and boys alike, and all ready, I believe, even us youngsters who had but just joined the service, to go anywhere and do anything for the sake of the Queen—God bless her!—aye, and to battle likewise for the old flag and the old country that has had the command of the seas for a thousand years—so father says!Why, there were over a hundred and eighty officers and men, besides some seven hundred odd boys present at muster.Just fancy!Yes; and though the men serve all the time of the ordinary three years’ commission of the ship, the boys are ever coming and going, forty-five or thereabouts, all fresh ones, being entered every month on the books; while as many, probably, are drafted during the same interim to the guardship, for service with the fleet in all parts of the world!Bear in mind, too, that theSaint Vincentis only one of some six or seven regular training-ships stationed at the principal ports round the kingdom, for the especial purpose of licking boys into shape for Her Majesty’s Service; and that these aspirants for naval fame and glory number altogether ten thousand, such being really the quota of young boy-sailors provided for in the Admiralty estimates and added to the Navy every year.Thinking thus, I rather lagged behind my comrades in going up the hatchway, only just succeeding in the nick of time in getting into my proper place forward on the starboard side of the ship as befitted my station; and where, being ahead of the line, I had a good view, while the inspection lasted, of the scene of my fight with ‘Ugly.’The boys were all drawn up in two long double rows facing each other, the ranks stretching away from where Mick and I stood near the knight-heads, to right abaft the mainmast; the first and third divisions, which together comprised the starboard watch, being on the right-hand side of the deck looking towards the bows, while the port watch was on the left, of equal strength and similarly stretched out—the watch stripes on the right or left arm, as the case might be, telling any chap who might chance to lose his latitude to which side he properly belonged.I had already, of course, seen the imposing display which this muster of the boys on the upper deck invariably presented; but never before had I taken such stock of its various details.However, before I could come to any conclusion in the matter, revolving, as I did, more things than I have yet spoken of in my busy brain, which seemed ‘all wool-gathered’ this morning, as father would have said had he been there and seen me star-gazing all round the compass, the boy-bugler on the bridge, who “had a purty foine chake of his own,” as Mick observed to me on noticing his puffed-out mouth, blew a resonant blast.It was the ‘disperse.’Hi, presto!As if by magic, the imposing array of ‘sucking bluejackets’ whom I had just been gazing upon with a sort of personal admiration from the fact of my being one of their number, an admiration which was tempered by a slight feeling of awe of the discipline that controlled them, melted away almost noiselessly, like those Arabs who ‘folded their tents’ according to the poem, the boys being all in their bare feet, and their patter along the deck and down the hatchways not making any sound above a faint shuffling; and soon this was drowned by the eldritch screeching of our friends the seagulls circling round on the wing in their wonted manner, and poising themselves anon in mid-air above the ship, looking down to see whether it was dinner-time yet aboard, and there was a chance of any stray scraps being chucked over the side from the ‘gashing-tub,’ or waste butt in which the refuse of our meals was thrown on the lower deck.The new boys of both watches were told to stand by, by one of the seaman-instructors; and so, instead of racing down below with our older comrades, Mick and I, with the other nine who had lately joined, remained on the fore part of the deck.“These boys, sir,” said the instructor, touching respectfully his cap as he advanced towards the officer of the watch, who stood on the quarter-deck, a thin grey-haired old chap, whom I subsequently learnt was the gunner, though I never had the pleasure of seeing him before, “haven’t been over the masthead yet, sir.”“All right,” replied the gentleman addressed, saluting the instructor in his turn; the politeness and courteous deference paid on board all ships belonging to Her Majesty’s Service from one officer to another, be his rank high or low, being one of the best lessons in manners that man or boy could have afloat or ashore, especially the latter. “Carry on!”Permission, accordingly, being granted for the ordeal to which we were about to be subjected, the smart seaman-instructor came back to where we were drawn up in single file forwards.“Now, my lads,” he said, “you haven’t any of you passed through your sea baptism yet, I think. Ever been up aloft, eh?”He had stopped in front of ‘Ugly,’ whose face yet bore traces of our recent combat, although the cuts on his lip and nose had healed up; and, indeed, I couldn’t well boast, for one of my eyes had a singularly picturesque greeny-yellowy look still about it.“Hoi?” exclaimed ‘Ugly,’ in his yokel fashion. “I dunno wot yer means, zur.”“Well, I’ll soon tell you,” rejoined the instructor. “I mean, have you ever been over the masthead?”“No–a,” said ‘Ugly,’ staring sheepishly at him; and then, as he followed his questioner’s eye, on it glancing up aloft, he added, “Doos yer mean oop there, zur?”“Aye.”“No–a, zur.”“Then, you’ll have to go up now,” said the instructor, in a tone that showed he intended to be obeyed. “Lads, attention!”We all drew ourselves up, ‘Ugly’ included, as rigid and woodeny as those strange figures that are supposed to represent the patriarchs Shem, Ham, and Japheth seen in the Noah’s arks of our childhood.“Boys,” cried the instructor in a louder key, pointing as he spoke, “you see the mainmast there?”We signified assent as well as we were able to do without losing our rigidity or speaking, which latter is strictly against rules when an officer is giving any order, except when an answer is specially demanded.Noticing, however, that we all looked in the right direction, the seaman-instructor was satisfied with this reply; but really there was no reason why he should not be so, for if we had not seen the tall spar that he pointed out we must all have been blind!At all events, he was satisfied; and that is all that concerns us at present.“Now, boys,” he continued, “you’ve got to go over the top of that there masthead, climbing right up the rigging on the port side, and coming down to starboard. Let me see which of you will be first to get over the crosstrees, and woe betide the last! Away you go, now, the lot o’ ye! ’Way aloft!”It was child’s play to me; for, as I told Larrikins the first day I was on board, when he was trying to ‘pull my leg’ with his yarns of the mountainous seas he met in the Channel cruising in theMartin, ‘shinning up the rigging’ was no novelty to me.Before you could say ‘Jack Robinson’ I had quickly sprung into the lee rigging; and, clambering up the ratlines and then outward by the futtock shrouds, I gained the top long ere half the rest had started.“Well done, my lad; I see you have been on board a ship before!” cried out the instructor, as I at once proceeded now to climb up to the crosstrees and over the head of the mast. “Look alive, you other chaps! That boy there will have done the job while you are thinking about it. Stir your stumps!”‘Ugly’ was the last of the lot; and, as I came down on the weather or starboard side of the ship, the wind then blowing from the nor’ard and eastward, he was just trying to creep through ‘the lubber’s hole’ into the top.“No you don’t,” shouted up the instructor after him. “You must climb out by the futtock shrouds, as every proper sailor does.”Seeing, however, that poor ‘Ugly’ was quite in a fog, he turned to me as I stepped down from the chains and stood up in front of him, touching my cap to report myself as having accomplished my task.“I say, my boy,” said he, “what’s your name?”Of course I had to reply to this, and so I told him—“Tom Bowling, sir.”“Ha!” he exclaimed, apparently surprised. “Any relation of that chap in the song who ‘went aloft and did his duty’?”I grinned.“Yes, sir, I believe so,” I said. “Father says as how our family is descended from him.”“I can quite believe it,” observed the instructor kindly, with a pleasant smile on his face. “At all events, a sailor’s blood runs in your veins, my lad; and, as you’re such a good climber and know your way up the ratlines, just go up now and show that lubber of a greenhorn how to get up the futtock shrouds without tumbling, and so over the masthead.”Accordingly, I raced aloft the second time and soon fetched up to ‘Ugly,’ who, in a mortal funk, was trying to step out from the lower rigging on to the futtock shrouds, which, I may explain for the benefit of those who have not been to sea, stretch out laterally from the mast, and not in towards it, like the ordinary standing rigging below.In spite of his difficulty, however, the surly brute now accepted my help with a very ill grace; muttering under his breath to himself some very unfriendly wishes in my respect, as, with some difficulty, I lugged him up into the top, almost by the scruff of his neck.The rest of the journey up and down was easy enough; and ‘Ugly,’ rendered bold by having crossed his goal, the crosstrees, disdaining any further help from me, now started, after he had arrived in the top, again on the return voyage to climb down the shrouds by himself.But hardly had he got his foot over the side of the top than his courage failed him; and I, looking up, on account of feeling the rigging shake, for I had gone down in advance from his telling me he ‘didn’t want no help from sich a cove as me,’ saw that he was trembling like an aspen leaf, while his face was as pale as death.“Hold on,” I cried, “I’ll be up with you in half a minute, and lend you a hand!”I don’t know whether he heard me or not as I scrambled up hastily towards him; but the next instant, losing his grip of the rope he was hanging on to somehow or other, he fell back on top of me, uttering a wild yell that was almost a scream, and which could have been heard ashore at Gosport!

“Tom,” said Mick to me, on my telling him this, when we were dismissed anon from instruction drill and were going up on the upper deck during the ‘break-off,’ for a brief breath of fresh air before proceeding below again to our tea, “wer that theer yarn thrue, sure, ye wos afther tellin’ me?”

He spoke earnestly, and I replied to him in the same tone. “It’s true enough, Mick, that one of our officers did manage to parbuckle a gun up to the top of a high rock, or, rather, mountain, which commanded the land defences of Castries, the principal town of Saint Lucia in the West Indies! I’ve heard father speak about it many a time,” said I. “But, ’pon my word, Mick, I can’t precisely recollect if it was the gallant Rodney or Sir Ralph Abercromby; for both of ’em were busy in those parts at the time, and pretty well made their mark too! All I can say is, though, that through this dodge they took the Frenchies unawares and gave them a dressing as British sailors have always done when we’ve been at loggerheads with them furrin chaps!”

Mick Donovan scratched his head, in the same solemn way father used to do, as if trying to rub in this valuable piece of historical information.

“Faith,” said he, “I can’t underconstubble it at all, at all!”

There our conversation came to an abrupt close; the bugle summoning us to supper, and Mick being extremely particular, I found, never to be late at meal-times if he could possibly help it!

The next morning, after the usual routine of lashing up and stowing our hammocks in the nettings, on the completion of our breakfast, it was the turn of the second division of the starboard watch, to which we belonged, as I have already detailed, to go to school in the big room on the lower deck aft, where we had passed our original initiatory examination before signing our papers.

The boys were given very fair play in respect of their nautical education, taking each department of their instruction turn and turn about in regular order.

For instance, if the port watch attended school from Three Bells to Seven Bells in the forenoon—that is, in shore time, from half-past nine to half-past eleven o’clock in the morning—the starboard watch would be engaged in seamanship or gunnery instruction; while, in the afternoon their respective avocations would be reversed, the ‘starbowlines’ going to their books, and the port watch occupying themselves with the other drills.

This day, as I have said, we went to school after inspection and prayers by the chaplain on the upper deck, which, I should have mentioned, was the usual routine every morning when breakfast was finished and the mess-tables and decks below swept clean and made tidy.

I remember one of the schoolmasters impressed me very much during a geography lesson, by showing us on the globe how extensive our national possessions were, and how it became us as British sailors to maintain our rights on every land and sea where the Union Jack of Old England had ever once floated.

I declare I can recollect his very words.

“The sun, my boys,” he said very impressively, “never sets on Her Majesty’s dominions!”

When school was over, and the bugle, that ever-sounding bugle, rang out the call for ‘divisions’ presently, we all bustled up, of course, to the upper deck, and, whether it was from the schoolmaster’s observation or what, I’m sure I can’t say, I was struck by the wonderful lot of fine fellows we had on board the training-ship: all wearing the same smart bluejacket uniform, men and boys alike, and all ready, I believe, even us youngsters who had but just joined the service, to go anywhere and do anything for the sake of the Queen—God bless her!—aye, and to battle likewise for the old flag and the old country that has had the command of the seas for a thousand years—so father says!

Why, there were over a hundred and eighty officers and men, besides some seven hundred odd boys present at muster.

Just fancy!

Yes; and though the men serve all the time of the ordinary three years’ commission of the ship, the boys are ever coming and going, forty-five or thereabouts, all fresh ones, being entered every month on the books; while as many, probably, are drafted during the same interim to the guardship, for service with the fleet in all parts of the world!

Bear in mind, too, that theSaint Vincentis only one of some six or seven regular training-ships stationed at the principal ports round the kingdom, for the especial purpose of licking boys into shape for Her Majesty’s Service; and that these aspirants for naval fame and glory number altogether ten thousand, such being really the quota of young boy-sailors provided for in the Admiralty estimates and added to the Navy every year.

Thinking thus, I rather lagged behind my comrades in going up the hatchway, only just succeeding in the nick of time in getting into my proper place forward on the starboard side of the ship as befitted my station; and where, being ahead of the line, I had a good view, while the inspection lasted, of the scene of my fight with ‘Ugly.’

The boys were all drawn up in two long double rows facing each other, the ranks stretching away from where Mick and I stood near the knight-heads, to right abaft the mainmast; the first and third divisions, which together comprised the starboard watch, being on the right-hand side of the deck looking towards the bows, while the port watch was on the left, of equal strength and similarly stretched out—the watch stripes on the right or left arm, as the case might be, telling any chap who might chance to lose his latitude to which side he properly belonged.

I had already, of course, seen the imposing display which this muster of the boys on the upper deck invariably presented; but never before had I taken such stock of its various details.

However, before I could come to any conclusion in the matter, revolving, as I did, more things than I have yet spoken of in my busy brain, which seemed ‘all wool-gathered’ this morning, as father would have said had he been there and seen me star-gazing all round the compass, the boy-bugler on the bridge, who “had a purty foine chake of his own,” as Mick observed to me on noticing his puffed-out mouth, blew a resonant blast.

It was the ‘disperse.’

Hi, presto!

As if by magic, the imposing array of ‘sucking bluejackets’ whom I had just been gazing upon with a sort of personal admiration from the fact of my being one of their number, an admiration which was tempered by a slight feeling of awe of the discipline that controlled them, melted away almost noiselessly, like those Arabs who ‘folded their tents’ according to the poem, the boys being all in their bare feet, and their patter along the deck and down the hatchways not making any sound above a faint shuffling; and soon this was drowned by the eldritch screeching of our friends the seagulls circling round on the wing in their wonted manner, and poising themselves anon in mid-air above the ship, looking down to see whether it was dinner-time yet aboard, and there was a chance of any stray scraps being chucked over the side from the ‘gashing-tub,’ or waste butt in which the refuse of our meals was thrown on the lower deck.

The new boys of both watches were told to stand by, by one of the seaman-instructors; and so, instead of racing down below with our older comrades, Mick and I, with the other nine who had lately joined, remained on the fore part of the deck.

“These boys, sir,” said the instructor, touching respectfully his cap as he advanced towards the officer of the watch, who stood on the quarter-deck, a thin grey-haired old chap, whom I subsequently learnt was the gunner, though I never had the pleasure of seeing him before, “haven’t been over the masthead yet, sir.”

“All right,” replied the gentleman addressed, saluting the instructor in his turn; the politeness and courteous deference paid on board all ships belonging to Her Majesty’s Service from one officer to another, be his rank high or low, being one of the best lessons in manners that man or boy could have afloat or ashore, especially the latter. “Carry on!”

Permission, accordingly, being granted for the ordeal to which we were about to be subjected, the smart seaman-instructor came back to where we were drawn up in single file forwards.

“Now, my lads,” he said, “you haven’t any of you passed through your sea baptism yet, I think. Ever been up aloft, eh?”

He had stopped in front of ‘Ugly,’ whose face yet bore traces of our recent combat, although the cuts on his lip and nose had healed up; and, indeed, I couldn’t well boast, for one of my eyes had a singularly picturesque greeny-yellowy look still about it.

“Hoi?” exclaimed ‘Ugly,’ in his yokel fashion. “I dunno wot yer means, zur.”

“Well, I’ll soon tell you,” rejoined the instructor. “I mean, have you ever been over the masthead?”

“No–a,” said ‘Ugly,’ staring sheepishly at him; and then, as he followed his questioner’s eye, on it glancing up aloft, he added, “Doos yer mean oop there, zur?”

“Aye.”

“No–a, zur.”

“Then, you’ll have to go up now,” said the instructor, in a tone that showed he intended to be obeyed. “Lads, attention!”

We all drew ourselves up, ‘Ugly’ included, as rigid and woodeny as those strange figures that are supposed to represent the patriarchs Shem, Ham, and Japheth seen in the Noah’s arks of our childhood.

“Boys,” cried the instructor in a louder key, pointing as he spoke, “you see the mainmast there?”

We signified assent as well as we were able to do without losing our rigidity or speaking, which latter is strictly against rules when an officer is giving any order, except when an answer is specially demanded.

Noticing, however, that we all looked in the right direction, the seaman-instructor was satisfied with this reply; but really there was no reason why he should not be so, for if we had not seen the tall spar that he pointed out we must all have been blind!

At all events, he was satisfied; and that is all that concerns us at present.

“Now, boys,” he continued, “you’ve got to go over the top of that there masthead, climbing right up the rigging on the port side, and coming down to starboard. Let me see which of you will be first to get over the crosstrees, and woe betide the last! Away you go, now, the lot o’ ye! ’Way aloft!”

It was child’s play to me; for, as I told Larrikins the first day I was on board, when he was trying to ‘pull my leg’ with his yarns of the mountainous seas he met in the Channel cruising in theMartin, ‘shinning up the rigging’ was no novelty to me.

Before you could say ‘Jack Robinson’ I had quickly sprung into the lee rigging; and, clambering up the ratlines and then outward by the futtock shrouds, I gained the top long ere half the rest had started.

“Well done, my lad; I see you have been on board a ship before!” cried out the instructor, as I at once proceeded now to climb up to the crosstrees and over the head of the mast. “Look alive, you other chaps! That boy there will have done the job while you are thinking about it. Stir your stumps!”

‘Ugly’ was the last of the lot; and, as I came down on the weather or starboard side of the ship, the wind then blowing from the nor’ard and eastward, he was just trying to creep through ‘the lubber’s hole’ into the top.

“No you don’t,” shouted up the instructor after him. “You must climb out by the futtock shrouds, as every proper sailor does.”

Seeing, however, that poor ‘Ugly’ was quite in a fog, he turned to me as I stepped down from the chains and stood up in front of him, touching my cap to report myself as having accomplished my task.

“I say, my boy,” said he, “what’s your name?”

Of course I had to reply to this, and so I told him—

“Tom Bowling, sir.”

“Ha!” he exclaimed, apparently surprised. “Any relation of that chap in the song who ‘went aloft and did his duty’?”

I grinned.

“Yes, sir, I believe so,” I said. “Father says as how our family is descended from him.”

“I can quite believe it,” observed the instructor kindly, with a pleasant smile on his face. “At all events, a sailor’s blood runs in your veins, my lad; and, as you’re such a good climber and know your way up the ratlines, just go up now and show that lubber of a greenhorn how to get up the futtock shrouds without tumbling, and so over the masthead.”

Accordingly, I raced aloft the second time and soon fetched up to ‘Ugly,’ who, in a mortal funk, was trying to step out from the lower rigging on to the futtock shrouds, which, I may explain for the benefit of those who have not been to sea, stretch out laterally from the mast, and not in towards it, like the ordinary standing rigging below.

In spite of his difficulty, however, the surly brute now accepted my help with a very ill grace; muttering under his breath to himself some very unfriendly wishes in my respect, as, with some difficulty, I lugged him up into the top, almost by the scruff of his neck.

The rest of the journey up and down was easy enough; and ‘Ugly,’ rendered bold by having crossed his goal, the crosstrees, disdaining any further help from me, now started, after he had arrived in the top, again on the return voyage to climb down the shrouds by himself.

But hardly had he got his foot over the side of the top than his courage failed him; and I, looking up, on account of feeling the rigging shake, for I had gone down in advance from his telling me he ‘didn’t want no help from sich a cove as me,’ saw that he was trembling like an aspen leaf, while his face was as pale as death.

“Hold on,” I cried, “I’ll be up with you in half a minute, and lend you a hand!”

I don’t know whether he heard me or not as I scrambled up hastily towards him; but the next instant, losing his grip of the rope he was hanging on to somehow or other, he fell back on top of me, uttering a wild yell that was almost a scream, and which could have been heard ashore at Gosport!

Chapter Eight.“The Sweets of Friendship.”“How did you manage it, my boy?” panted out the instructor, out of breath by his rapid climb up the rigging to my aid, as I held on desperately to the shrouds, against which I pressed the body of my unconscious shipmate with my own, to prevent him from falling. “Lord! My lad, I thought you were both gone! Thank God, you saved him!”But I could not tell him then, or after, how I contrived to catch ‘Ugly’ when he let go his hold; and to this very day, though it is pretty nearly six years or more agone, and many things have happened since even stranger, too, I put down the spontaneous act that prompted me to stretch out my hand in the nick of time and grip him by his waistbelt before it was too late, to the interposition of Providence—an intervention, indeed, not only on his behalf, but on my own, as subsequent events proved, though I will speak of this when the proper time comes.The instructor, even in his hurry aloft to our assistance, had managed to snatch up on the way a coil of half-inch; and with this he now proceeded, breathing heavily the while from his exertions, to secure ‘Ugly’ temporarily to the ratlines until a whip could be rigged for sending down the still insensible fellow to the deck below.This was a great relief to me, for it was as much as I could do to support his body, although, as I’ve said, I pressed him against the rigging, the chap weighing over ten stone at least, I should think, as he was a thickset yokel and inclined to be corpulent.It all happened in a moment, though I seem to take so long telling about it; for, almost before the instructor could take a double turn with his half-inch round ‘Ugly’s’ body and the rigging, half-a-dozen seamen, who had been hailed by the officer of the watch, the grey-haired gunner, had footed it up the ratlines and were in the top fixing a whip and purchase, to which one of the hammocks had been attached.In this impromptu cradle ‘Ugly’ was let down very carefully and taken to the sick-bay, where, as I was afterwards told, Mr Trimmens the sick-berth steward being my informant, it required the application of the galvanic battery to bring him to, the fright he had undergone, and consequent shock to his system, having been so great!“You saved his life, though, my lad, let me tell you,” said the instructor to me, when we had followed the rescued boy down, and were again on the safe footing of the deck. “Why, Tom Bowling, that chap ought to be your friend for life after this.”I could not help shrugging my shoulders, with a grin ‘on the left side of my mouth,’ as sailors say; for, of course, I could not very well explain matters anent our recent fight.The instructor looked at me inquiringly; and, seeing he expected some sort of a reply from me, I said, “He’ll have to change very much, sir. He and I haven’t been very friendly up to now, sir.”“Ah!” rejoined the instructor, “that don’t count, my boy. The dearest friend I have in the world at the present time was once my bitterest enemy. He and I fell out about some trifle or other on joining the same ship and never spoke a single word to each other throughout the whole commission, though we were up the Straits at the time, and saw some queer rigs there, I can tell you. We’ve often laughed over it together since, and thought what fools we were.”“I don’t think, sir,” said I, “that Moses Reeks and I will ever be friends, so far as I can see.”“Well, time will tell,” observed my good-natured adviser, who was a man like father, I saw, one always anxious to make the best of everything. “None of us ever know what will happen in this life, especially with sailor folk; and though you may think it difficult to ‘make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear,’ for I can see, my lad, with half an eye that that unfortunate yokel is of a different stamp to you, still I’ve known stranger things occur. I wouldn’t mind betting, if I ever did such a thing, that one day you and he will be the fastest chums.”“Perhaps, sir,” I answered, in a very doubting manner; and I couldn’t help adding, as I turned to go below to my dinner, if there should be any left for me, the other fellows having pretty well done by this time, “Some day, as father says, pigs may fly, sir!”The instructor laughed.“Your father, Tom Bowling,” said he, giving me a friendly pat on the shoulder as I went down the after-hatchway, “must be a knowing hand; and I think, my lad, you take after him.”It being ‘pea doo and bolliky’ day, my fast friend Mick, who, from his highly developed instincts in the grub line, had been elected cook of our mess on the lower deck, had saved me a good basin of soup and hunch of bread, with which I managed to assuage the cravings of my appetite, this having been accentuated not only by my long wait but by my exercise aloft.“Begorrah, Tom,” said he, as he watched me tucking into the stuff with great complacency, while the rest of the fellows were cleaning up the mess-table and generally making things snug, “it’s as good as aitin’ onesilf fur to say how ye git outside that pay-soup. An ould play-acting chap I onst sayd a-swallerin’ knoives an’ sich loike onnatural stuff, worn’t a patch on ye, me hearty!”I had, however, to make short work of my meal, for the ‘assembly’ just then sounded; and, after our usual parade again on deck, according to the routine, a part of our division went ashore to a large field between Blockhouse Fort and Haslar on the Gosport side of the water, belonging to theSaint Vincent, and which is used for drilling the boys in marching and small-arm instruction.Some of the remainder of us were put to signalling on the upper deck, carrying on highly interesting dialogues with small flags that were waved to and fro between the bows and stern of the ship; but the major part of the division—I, much to my delight, being one of the number—practised all the afternoon at boat-pulling. In this my experience with father’s wherry during the last three or four years stood me in good stead; though I had some little difficulty at first in mastering the usual man-o’-war stroke with the long ash oars in the heavy launch which we pulled, the boat being double-banked.The next day was the most exciting I had passed since I had been on board the ship, now over a week.To begin with, it was ‘pay-day,’ the whole ship’s company marching up to the paymaster in turn at the temporary office he had rigged upal fresco, as Mick’s ‘Oitalian’ friends would say, on the upper deck, and receiving each his weekly pay; the boys being allowed, those of the first-class a shilling, and those of the second sixpence, for pocket-money, the balance being saved up to their account or else forwarded to their parents.Much amusement was caused amongst us as we received the respective coins to which we were entitled, each holding out his cap for them; for a sailor, you know, puts everything in his cap. Pocketing our coin as we went below, Mick created the greatest fun of all as he spit on his and spun it in the air. “Hooray!” he cried out, against the regulations, though, fortunately for himself, not too loud, as he skated down the hatchway. “Begorrah, it’s the foorst money Oi iver arnt in me loif! Faith, Tom mabouchal, we’ll spind it togither an’ hev a rig’ler jollification ashore!”The bugle sounded ‘cooks to their messes’ as Mick was saying this; and so off he hurried to the galley on the fore part of the middle deck when we had got down the hatchway, I following after him.On passing the entry-port, however, my old friend the master-at-arms hailed me.“Hi, Tom Bowling!” he called out, beckoning me into the office; “I hope you haven’t been getting into any row?”“Not that I know of, sir,” said I, flabbergasted by his question. “Why, sir?”“Because the captain left word he wants to speak to you,” he replied. “You must go up again on the main-deck to his quarters aft.”Thoroughly frightened at this, I proceeded as he had directed me; and, on reaching the door of the captain’s cabin, the marine sentry standing outside passed on my name and I was ushered in.Cap in hand and in a state of much trepidation, I went along the gangway with him; and ‘bringing up’ opposite an open door, I rapped at this with my heart in my mouth.“Hallo!” cried a voice within. “Who’s there?”“T–t–t,” I stammered— “T–T’m Bowling, sir.”“Oh!” exclaimed the same voice, in a softer and more kindly tone than at first, when, I confess, it sounded rather gruff and peremptory. “Come in, Tom Bowling.”With this, I went into what seemed to my eye, expecting, as I did, something very different on board ship, one of the grandest apartments I had ever seen; with sofas and pictures, and big looking-glasses, besides a piano at the end, just like a drawing-room. Why, the Queen herself couldn’t have had a finer place to live in!The captain, who, of course, was the owner of the voice that had previously spoken, I saw was a nice, pleasant-faced, good-looking officer, looking every inch a sailor, and a smart one too!He was sitting in a comfortable easy-chair that was fitted with gimbals, like the compass card in a binnacle, or some other appliance which permitted the occupant to shift round as he pleased without moving the seat; as my commanding officer did now, in order to face me.“Don’t be afraid, my lad,” he said kindly, seeing, no doubt, how nervous I looked. “I’ve only sent for you to let you know that I have been told of your exceedingly courageous conduct just now in saving your shipmate from a terrible death. I’m glad to see that you are bearing out by your behaviour the strong recommendation Captain Mordaunt, who is an old friend of mine, sent me when you came to join the service.”I declare you could have knocked me down with a feather on his saying this, the revulsion of feeling being so great; for I had expected something totally different, so I hardly knew what to say.“Th–a–ank you, sir,” I at last managed to get out. “I—I—I am very much obliged to you, sir.”“No obligation at all, my lad,” he said, smiling. “I am only giving you your due, for I think you have really behaved in a very plucky manner, and deserve all that I have said, and more. I must tell you, though, I have heard something else also about you, Tom Bowling, which, perhaps, I might have been inclined to speak about, for I don’t like any fighting or ill-feeling between the boys under my command here; but, after what has occurred, I shall not take any notice of what I might have heard to your detriment. Besides, I believe you were not particularly in fault, all things considered.”Fancy! He must have been told of the fight between ‘Ugly’ and me.My face, no doubt, expressed the thoughts that passed through my mind; and, as I could see from a mirror opposite me, I appeared, as father used to say, “like a cat looking nine ways for Sunday!”The captain, though, evidently wished to set me at my ease.“Never mind, my boy,” he said reassuringly. “We’ll let bygones be bygones; and, as you have so nobly condoned the offence of fighting with your shipmate by subsequently saving his life, I feel more inclined to reward than punish you. Have you been allowed ashore yet to see your parents since you joined?”“No, sir,” I replied. “I didn’t have my uniform rig last Sunday, sir.”“Well, then, my boy, you may go and see them this afternoon if you like, when you’ve finished your dinner. I will give you leave till Eight Bells.”So saying, he scribbled on a piece of paper and handed it to me.This was a pass, permitting me to be absent from the ship until the time specified on it.Noticing, as I thanked him for his kindness, that I did not appear perfectly satisfied, he glanced at me scrutinisingly. His eye was like a gimlet, and seemed to penetrate my inmost thoughts; for, I declare, he guessed the feeling that was uppermost in my mind.“Would you like, my lad,” he said, smiling again, “to take a chum with you ashore?”“Why, sir,” I exclaimed, “that was the very thing I was thinking of!”“Ha!” said he, “I fancied that was what was on your mind. Who is your chum?”“Mick Donovan, sir,” I replied; “he’s an Irish lad who joined the ship the same time as me.”“All right; Mick Donovan shall go with you,” said he. “Hand me back your pass.”This I did; whereupon he bracketed Mick’s name with mine and returned me the paper.“You may go now,” he said kindly, seeing the rush of joy that must have been reflected on my face, filling, as it did, my heart, though I hesitated to leave without his permission, albeit anxious to communicate the good news to Mick. “Stop, Tom, here’s half-a-crown for you and your chum to enjoy yourselves with.”He put the money into my hand as he spoke, extracting it from his pocket for the purpose; and, I recollect, it was a nice new bright half-crown piece, which, though it was ‘melted’ very soon, will never pass out of my remembrance as quickly as it did from my possession!Of course I thanked him before leaving; and, in going below, I halted at the police office, to tell the master-at-arms the result of my interview with our chief, whereat he appeared much satisfied, though he cautioned me to continue to be a good boy and not outstay my leave.Making my way from thence below, it didn’t take me long to fetch up alongside Mick, who almost exploded with delight on my informing him we were to go ashore together. He pitched the piece of ‘gammy duff’ he was carving on his plate, which, by the way, was as hard as a brickbat, with the raisins or ‘gammies’ which it contained barely at signal distance apart, right up above his head to the deck beam, where it caught on to one of the hooks and remained a fixture.“Bedad, Tom, ye’re an anjul if ivver ther wor one,” he cried, capering about as if he were mad. “We’ll hev a splindid toime of it entoirely. Faith, Oi’ll go and git me hair cut, to look like a jintlemin, afore I says yer sisther an’ yer fayther and moother!”“I think I’ll do the same, Mick,” said I. “They haven’t seen me in my bluejacket rig yet, and I want to look as smart as I can too!”Accordingly, the two of us had recourse to the ship’s barber, who cropped us both so close that it would have puzzled anybody to have caught hold of what hair was left on the heads of either, aye even between his thumb and forefinger.As a boat was leaving the ship early in the afternoon, we went in her; when, being landed at Point, we soon found our way to Bonfire Corner, I, of course, acting as the navigator.Dear me, no one ever saw such a homecoming in their life before as that of mine that day!Jenny, who was dusting a mat at the door, rushed frantically into my arms, mat and all, my little sister hugging me as if we had really been parted for years, instead of only for the short spell of time that had elapsed since our separation; and my mother, who was not so demonstrative, was quite as glad, I know, to see me; while as for father, who was having a spell-off in the backyard with his pipe, he beamed all over at the sight of me in my uniform.“Lor’, Tom!” he ejaculated, on my taking him unawares, with his head leaning back and the long churchwarden he was smoking dropping out of his mouth, for he had just started, with his eyes closed, for a ‘lay off the land,’ as he styled taking a snooze. “Ye’re the very h’image of what I wer’ when I wer’ your age—though not quite so good-looking I’m a-thinking!”He said this in joke, for he and I were in the habit when in the wherry together of carrying on in that way and chaffing each other; but mother, who had followed me up, with Jenny behind her and Mick Donovan keeping close company in her wake, took poor father up with a round turn!“What do you know what you were like at his age?” she cried. “Judging by your present figurehead, you couldn’t have been much to boast of!”“Couldn’t I?” rejoined father. “I tell you what, Sarah, there wer’ a lot more gals ’sides you as wos a-runnin’ arter me when I was a youngster and first jined the sarvice!” Hearing my mother’s name mentioned, old ‘Ally Sloper’ at once struck up a screech, hopping through from the shop to join us.“Say-rah, Say-rah!” he screamed, ruffling up the lemon crest on the top of his head, and spreading out the feathers round his neck that made him look as if he wore high collars. “I’ll wring your neck!”I thought Mick Donovan would have died of laughing on hearing the cockatoo speak so funnily, his mirth being so contagious that we all followed suit; and, what with the screeching and screaming of the other birds, which seemed to take ‘Ally Sloper’s’ cry for a signal and chimed in, you never heard such a row in your life.“Bedad, Oi’m kilt entoirely!” exclaimed Mick, when he had well-nigh laughed himself black in the face. “Oi nivver heerd such a baste in me loife fur talkin’, to bay sure!”That made us all begin the concert over again; and I really think we kept on laughing and then stopping, only to break out again, until mother spread the table for tea, just to “shut our mouths,” as she said.Both she and father were really pleased to see Mick, whom they had welcomed as my chum in the first instance, but presently began to like for his own sake after his being but a very short time in their presence—he was such a jolly chap all round!My sister, however, seemed a bit shy with him, as indeed Mick appeared to be with her, the two hardly exchanging a word; though I noticed that when Jack, the thrush, commenced calling out in his soft way, “Jenny! Jenny!” Mick flushed up like a boiled lobster.“Faith,” he exclaimed, “that’s a foine burd, an’ a purty burd too; an’, begorrah, he spakes the purtiest name I ivver heerd tell on in me loife.”He looked at Jenny as he said this; when, she too coloured up.I couldn’t tell you all that occurred that happy day, for the moments flew by like winking; and bye-and-bye we had to set sail again for our ship, laden with all sorts of good things to help out our diet on board, especially an enormous pot of jam, which mother said would last us for tea till we were able to come ashore again for another supply.Father came with us down to Hardway, offering to put us on board in his wherry; and, though it was a longer voyage thence back to the ship than from Point, the tide being fortunately in our favour, we reached theSaint Vincentin good time, going up the accommodation ladder on the port side, which, as you know, is devoted to the use of the lower deck portion of the crew, just as Eight Bells struck.“Ha, my lads,” cried the ‘Jaunty,’ who stood by the entry-port, “you’ve just saved your bacon!”The other fellows were just coming down from skylarking; and, going below with the lot, we found time before turning in—Mick having declared that he was “hungry enuf to ate an illiphant”—to sample the stock of grub mother had so thoughtfully provided us with.The sight of the big jam-pot, however, presently attracted a crowd of sympathisers around us, whose affability and kindly attentions, nay, even respectful demeanour, was something wonderful.Mick and I never knew till then what dear friends we had aboard; any boy with whom we might have exchanged a chance word appearing as delighted to see us again as if we had risen from the dead.Amongst these, Larrikins was prominent.“Lor’, Tom Bowling,” he whispered to me, as he sidled up near, “yer knows I tuk a fancy to yer when I see’d yer first.”“So you did, my joker,” said I, of course seeing through his ‘little game,’ as well as that of ‘Ginger,’ the other first-class boy who had been told off to attend to us novices, and had, it may be remembered, acted as ‘Ugly’s’ second. “You cut me down when I was in my hammock the first night I was aboard. That was a strong proof of your friendship towards me, eh, Larrikins?”“Ah, Tom, that were only a little joke, don-cher-no,” he replied, with a grin and a wink of the most expressive character, “Lor’, yer don’t bear no mallerce, I knows!”What could I say?He was not half a bad fellow either; and so, having experienced many a little kindness from him as a new hand, in spite of his strong propensity for practical-joking at my expense, which I do not believe he could have possibly resisted under any circumstances, I passed the word to Mick to make him free of the jam-pot.So, too, with the rest of those that hung round us, sailors and sailor-boys generally being generous alike by nature and inclination; and the end of it was, that the supply which mother thought would have lasted Mick and me till we saw her again, vanished the same night!

“How did you manage it, my boy?” panted out the instructor, out of breath by his rapid climb up the rigging to my aid, as I held on desperately to the shrouds, against which I pressed the body of my unconscious shipmate with my own, to prevent him from falling. “Lord! My lad, I thought you were both gone! Thank God, you saved him!”

But I could not tell him then, or after, how I contrived to catch ‘Ugly’ when he let go his hold; and to this very day, though it is pretty nearly six years or more agone, and many things have happened since even stranger, too, I put down the spontaneous act that prompted me to stretch out my hand in the nick of time and grip him by his waistbelt before it was too late, to the interposition of Providence—an intervention, indeed, not only on his behalf, but on my own, as subsequent events proved, though I will speak of this when the proper time comes.

The instructor, even in his hurry aloft to our assistance, had managed to snatch up on the way a coil of half-inch; and with this he now proceeded, breathing heavily the while from his exertions, to secure ‘Ugly’ temporarily to the ratlines until a whip could be rigged for sending down the still insensible fellow to the deck below.

This was a great relief to me, for it was as much as I could do to support his body, although, as I’ve said, I pressed him against the rigging, the chap weighing over ten stone at least, I should think, as he was a thickset yokel and inclined to be corpulent.

It all happened in a moment, though I seem to take so long telling about it; for, almost before the instructor could take a double turn with his half-inch round ‘Ugly’s’ body and the rigging, half-a-dozen seamen, who had been hailed by the officer of the watch, the grey-haired gunner, had footed it up the ratlines and were in the top fixing a whip and purchase, to which one of the hammocks had been attached.

In this impromptu cradle ‘Ugly’ was let down very carefully and taken to the sick-bay, where, as I was afterwards told, Mr Trimmens the sick-berth steward being my informant, it required the application of the galvanic battery to bring him to, the fright he had undergone, and consequent shock to his system, having been so great!

“You saved his life, though, my lad, let me tell you,” said the instructor to me, when we had followed the rescued boy down, and were again on the safe footing of the deck. “Why, Tom Bowling, that chap ought to be your friend for life after this.”

I could not help shrugging my shoulders, with a grin ‘on the left side of my mouth,’ as sailors say; for, of course, I could not very well explain matters anent our recent fight.

The instructor looked at me inquiringly; and, seeing he expected some sort of a reply from me, I said, “He’ll have to change very much, sir. He and I haven’t been very friendly up to now, sir.”

“Ah!” rejoined the instructor, “that don’t count, my boy. The dearest friend I have in the world at the present time was once my bitterest enemy. He and I fell out about some trifle or other on joining the same ship and never spoke a single word to each other throughout the whole commission, though we were up the Straits at the time, and saw some queer rigs there, I can tell you. We’ve often laughed over it together since, and thought what fools we were.”

“I don’t think, sir,” said I, “that Moses Reeks and I will ever be friends, so far as I can see.”

“Well, time will tell,” observed my good-natured adviser, who was a man like father, I saw, one always anxious to make the best of everything. “None of us ever know what will happen in this life, especially with sailor folk; and though you may think it difficult to ‘make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear,’ for I can see, my lad, with half an eye that that unfortunate yokel is of a different stamp to you, still I’ve known stranger things occur. I wouldn’t mind betting, if I ever did such a thing, that one day you and he will be the fastest chums.”

“Perhaps, sir,” I answered, in a very doubting manner; and I couldn’t help adding, as I turned to go below to my dinner, if there should be any left for me, the other fellows having pretty well done by this time, “Some day, as father says, pigs may fly, sir!”

The instructor laughed.

“Your father, Tom Bowling,” said he, giving me a friendly pat on the shoulder as I went down the after-hatchway, “must be a knowing hand; and I think, my lad, you take after him.”

It being ‘pea doo and bolliky’ day, my fast friend Mick, who, from his highly developed instincts in the grub line, had been elected cook of our mess on the lower deck, had saved me a good basin of soup and hunch of bread, with which I managed to assuage the cravings of my appetite, this having been accentuated not only by my long wait but by my exercise aloft.

“Begorrah, Tom,” said he, as he watched me tucking into the stuff with great complacency, while the rest of the fellows were cleaning up the mess-table and generally making things snug, “it’s as good as aitin’ onesilf fur to say how ye git outside that pay-soup. An ould play-acting chap I onst sayd a-swallerin’ knoives an’ sich loike onnatural stuff, worn’t a patch on ye, me hearty!”

I had, however, to make short work of my meal, for the ‘assembly’ just then sounded; and, after our usual parade again on deck, according to the routine, a part of our division went ashore to a large field between Blockhouse Fort and Haslar on the Gosport side of the water, belonging to theSaint Vincent, and which is used for drilling the boys in marching and small-arm instruction.

Some of the remainder of us were put to signalling on the upper deck, carrying on highly interesting dialogues with small flags that were waved to and fro between the bows and stern of the ship; but the major part of the division—I, much to my delight, being one of the number—practised all the afternoon at boat-pulling. In this my experience with father’s wherry during the last three or four years stood me in good stead; though I had some little difficulty at first in mastering the usual man-o’-war stroke with the long ash oars in the heavy launch which we pulled, the boat being double-banked.

The next day was the most exciting I had passed since I had been on board the ship, now over a week.

To begin with, it was ‘pay-day,’ the whole ship’s company marching up to the paymaster in turn at the temporary office he had rigged upal fresco, as Mick’s ‘Oitalian’ friends would say, on the upper deck, and receiving each his weekly pay; the boys being allowed, those of the first-class a shilling, and those of the second sixpence, for pocket-money, the balance being saved up to their account or else forwarded to their parents.

Much amusement was caused amongst us as we received the respective coins to which we were entitled, each holding out his cap for them; for a sailor, you know, puts everything in his cap. Pocketing our coin as we went below, Mick created the greatest fun of all as he spit on his and spun it in the air. “Hooray!” he cried out, against the regulations, though, fortunately for himself, not too loud, as he skated down the hatchway. “Begorrah, it’s the foorst money Oi iver arnt in me loif! Faith, Tom mabouchal, we’ll spind it togither an’ hev a rig’ler jollification ashore!”

The bugle sounded ‘cooks to their messes’ as Mick was saying this; and so off he hurried to the galley on the fore part of the middle deck when we had got down the hatchway, I following after him.

On passing the entry-port, however, my old friend the master-at-arms hailed me.

“Hi, Tom Bowling!” he called out, beckoning me into the office; “I hope you haven’t been getting into any row?”

“Not that I know of, sir,” said I, flabbergasted by his question. “Why, sir?”

“Because the captain left word he wants to speak to you,” he replied. “You must go up again on the main-deck to his quarters aft.”

Thoroughly frightened at this, I proceeded as he had directed me; and, on reaching the door of the captain’s cabin, the marine sentry standing outside passed on my name and I was ushered in.

Cap in hand and in a state of much trepidation, I went along the gangway with him; and ‘bringing up’ opposite an open door, I rapped at this with my heart in my mouth.

“Hallo!” cried a voice within. “Who’s there?”

“T–t–t,” I stammered— “T–T’m Bowling, sir.”

“Oh!” exclaimed the same voice, in a softer and more kindly tone than at first, when, I confess, it sounded rather gruff and peremptory. “Come in, Tom Bowling.”

With this, I went into what seemed to my eye, expecting, as I did, something very different on board ship, one of the grandest apartments I had ever seen; with sofas and pictures, and big looking-glasses, besides a piano at the end, just like a drawing-room. Why, the Queen herself couldn’t have had a finer place to live in!

The captain, who, of course, was the owner of the voice that had previously spoken, I saw was a nice, pleasant-faced, good-looking officer, looking every inch a sailor, and a smart one too!

He was sitting in a comfortable easy-chair that was fitted with gimbals, like the compass card in a binnacle, or some other appliance which permitted the occupant to shift round as he pleased without moving the seat; as my commanding officer did now, in order to face me.

“Don’t be afraid, my lad,” he said kindly, seeing, no doubt, how nervous I looked. “I’ve only sent for you to let you know that I have been told of your exceedingly courageous conduct just now in saving your shipmate from a terrible death. I’m glad to see that you are bearing out by your behaviour the strong recommendation Captain Mordaunt, who is an old friend of mine, sent me when you came to join the service.”

I declare you could have knocked me down with a feather on his saying this, the revulsion of feeling being so great; for I had expected something totally different, so I hardly knew what to say.

“Th–a–ank you, sir,” I at last managed to get out. “I—I—I am very much obliged to you, sir.”

“No obligation at all, my lad,” he said, smiling. “I am only giving you your due, for I think you have really behaved in a very plucky manner, and deserve all that I have said, and more. I must tell you, though, I have heard something else also about you, Tom Bowling, which, perhaps, I might have been inclined to speak about, for I don’t like any fighting or ill-feeling between the boys under my command here; but, after what has occurred, I shall not take any notice of what I might have heard to your detriment. Besides, I believe you were not particularly in fault, all things considered.”

Fancy! He must have been told of the fight between ‘Ugly’ and me.

My face, no doubt, expressed the thoughts that passed through my mind; and, as I could see from a mirror opposite me, I appeared, as father used to say, “like a cat looking nine ways for Sunday!”

The captain, though, evidently wished to set me at my ease.

“Never mind, my boy,” he said reassuringly. “We’ll let bygones be bygones; and, as you have so nobly condoned the offence of fighting with your shipmate by subsequently saving his life, I feel more inclined to reward than punish you. Have you been allowed ashore yet to see your parents since you joined?”

“No, sir,” I replied. “I didn’t have my uniform rig last Sunday, sir.”

“Well, then, my boy, you may go and see them this afternoon if you like, when you’ve finished your dinner. I will give you leave till Eight Bells.”

So saying, he scribbled on a piece of paper and handed it to me.

This was a pass, permitting me to be absent from the ship until the time specified on it.

Noticing, as I thanked him for his kindness, that I did not appear perfectly satisfied, he glanced at me scrutinisingly. His eye was like a gimlet, and seemed to penetrate my inmost thoughts; for, I declare, he guessed the feeling that was uppermost in my mind.

“Would you like, my lad,” he said, smiling again, “to take a chum with you ashore?”

“Why, sir,” I exclaimed, “that was the very thing I was thinking of!”

“Ha!” said he, “I fancied that was what was on your mind. Who is your chum?”

“Mick Donovan, sir,” I replied; “he’s an Irish lad who joined the ship the same time as me.”

“All right; Mick Donovan shall go with you,” said he. “Hand me back your pass.”

This I did; whereupon he bracketed Mick’s name with mine and returned me the paper.

“You may go now,” he said kindly, seeing the rush of joy that must have been reflected on my face, filling, as it did, my heart, though I hesitated to leave without his permission, albeit anxious to communicate the good news to Mick. “Stop, Tom, here’s half-a-crown for you and your chum to enjoy yourselves with.”

He put the money into my hand as he spoke, extracting it from his pocket for the purpose; and, I recollect, it was a nice new bright half-crown piece, which, though it was ‘melted’ very soon, will never pass out of my remembrance as quickly as it did from my possession!

Of course I thanked him before leaving; and, in going below, I halted at the police office, to tell the master-at-arms the result of my interview with our chief, whereat he appeared much satisfied, though he cautioned me to continue to be a good boy and not outstay my leave.

Making my way from thence below, it didn’t take me long to fetch up alongside Mick, who almost exploded with delight on my informing him we were to go ashore together. He pitched the piece of ‘gammy duff’ he was carving on his plate, which, by the way, was as hard as a brickbat, with the raisins or ‘gammies’ which it contained barely at signal distance apart, right up above his head to the deck beam, where it caught on to one of the hooks and remained a fixture.

“Bedad, Tom, ye’re an anjul if ivver ther wor one,” he cried, capering about as if he were mad. “We’ll hev a splindid toime of it entoirely. Faith, Oi’ll go and git me hair cut, to look like a jintlemin, afore I says yer sisther an’ yer fayther and moother!”

“I think I’ll do the same, Mick,” said I. “They haven’t seen me in my bluejacket rig yet, and I want to look as smart as I can too!”

Accordingly, the two of us had recourse to the ship’s barber, who cropped us both so close that it would have puzzled anybody to have caught hold of what hair was left on the heads of either, aye even between his thumb and forefinger.

As a boat was leaving the ship early in the afternoon, we went in her; when, being landed at Point, we soon found our way to Bonfire Corner, I, of course, acting as the navigator.

Dear me, no one ever saw such a homecoming in their life before as that of mine that day!

Jenny, who was dusting a mat at the door, rushed frantically into my arms, mat and all, my little sister hugging me as if we had really been parted for years, instead of only for the short spell of time that had elapsed since our separation; and my mother, who was not so demonstrative, was quite as glad, I know, to see me; while as for father, who was having a spell-off in the backyard with his pipe, he beamed all over at the sight of me in my uniform.

“Lor’, Tom!” he ejaculated, on my taking him unawares, with his head leaning back and the long churchwarden he was smoking dropping out of his mouth, for he had just started, with his eyes closed, for a ‘lay off the land,’ as he styled taking a snooze. “Ye’re the very h’image of what I wer’ when I wer’ your age—though not quite so good-looking I’m a-thinking!”

He said this in joke, for he and I were in the habit when in the wherry together of carrying on in that way and chaffing each other; but mother, who had followed me up, with Jenny behind her and Mick Donovan keeping close company in her wake, took poor father up with a round turn!

“What do you know what you were like at his age?” she cried. “Judging by your present figurehead, you couldn’t have been much to boast of!”

“Couldn’t I?” rejoined father. “I tell you what, Sarah, there wer’ a lot more gals ’sides you as wos a-runnin’ arter me when I was a youngster and first jined the sarvice!” Hearing my mother’s name mentioned, old ‘Ally Sloper’ at once struck up a screech, hopping through from the shop to join us.

“Say-rah, Say-rah!” he screamed, ruffling up the lemon crest on the top of his head, and spreading out the feathers round his neck that made him look as if he wore high collars. “I’ll wring your neck!”

I thought Mick Donovan would have died of laughing on hearing the cockatoo speak so funnily, his mirth being so contagious that we all followed suit; and, what with the screeching and screaming of the other birds, which seemed to take ‘Ally Sloper’s’ cry for a signal and chimed in, you never heard such a row in your life.

“Bedad, Oi’m kilt entoirely!” exclaimed Mick, when he had well-nigh laughed himself black in the face. “Oi nivver heerd such a baste in me loife fur talkin’, to bay sure!”

That made us all begin the concert over again; and I really think we kept on laughing and then stopping, only to break out again, until mother spread the table for tea, just to “shut our mouths,” as she said.

Both she and father were really pleased to see Mick, whom they had welcomed as my chum in the first instance, but presently began to like for his own sake after his being but a very short time in their presence—he was such a jolly chap all round!

My sister, however, seemed a bit shy with him, as indeed Mick appeared to be with her, the two hardly exchanging a word; though I noticed that when Jack, the thrush, commenced calling out in his soft way, “Jenny! Jenny!” Mick flushed up like a boiled lobster.

“Faith,” he exclaimed, “that’s a foine burd, an’ a purty burd too; an’, begorrah, he spakes the purtiest name I ivver heerd tell on in me loife.”

He looked at Jenny as he said this; when, she too coloured up.

I couldn’t tell you all that occurred that happy day, for the moments flew by like winking; and bye-and-bye we had to set sail again for our ship, laden with all sorts of good things to help out our diet on board, especially an enormous pot of jam, which mother said would last us for tea till we were able to come ashore again for another supply.

Father came with us down to Hardway, offering to put us on board in his wherry; and, though it was a longer voyage thence back to the ship than from Point, the tide being fortunately in our favour, we reached theSaint Vincentin good time, going up the accommodation ladder on the port side, which, as you know, is devoted to the use of the lower deck portion of the crew, just as Eight Bells struck.

“Ha, my lads,” cried the ‘Jaunty,’ who stood by the entry-port, “you’ve just saved your bacon!”

The other fellows were just coming down from skylarking; and, going below with the lot, we found time before turning in—Mick having declared that he was “hungry enuf to ate an illiphant”—to sample the stock of grub mother had so thoughtfully provided us with.

The sight of the big jam-pot, however, presently attracted a crowd of sympathisers around us, whose affability and kindly attentions, nay, even respectful demeanour, was something wonderful.

Mick and I never knew till then what dear friends we had aboard; any boy with whom we might have exchanged a chance word appearing as delighted to see us again as if we had risen from the dead.

Amongst these, Larrikins was prominent.

“Lor’, Tom Bowling,” he whispered to me, as he sidled up near, “yer knows I tuk a fancy to yer when I see’d yer first.”

“So you did, my joker,” said I, of course seeing through his ‘little game,’ as well as that of ‘Ginger,’ the other first-class boy who had been told off to attend to us novices, and had, it may be remembered, acted as ‘Ugly’s’ second. “You cut me down when I was in my hammock the first night I was aboard. That was a strong proof of your friendship towards me, eh, Larrikins?”

“Ah, Tom, that were only a little joke, don-cher-no,” he replied, with a grin and a wink of the most expressive character, “Lor’, yer don’t bear no mallerce, I knows!”

What could I say?

He was not half a bad fellow either; and so, having experienced many a little kindness from him as a new hand, in spite of his strong propensity for practical-joking at my expense, which I do not believe he could have possibly resisted under any circumstances, I passed the word to Mick to make him free of the jam-pot.

So, too, with the rest of those that hung round us, sailors and sailor-boys generally being generous alike by nature and inclination; and the end of it was, that the supply which mother thought would have lasted Mick and me till we saw her again, vanished the same night!

Chapter Nine.I Become a “First-Class Boy.”Our life aboard after this passed very evenly, though not uneventfully; for there was hardly a day that something did not occur as interesting as it was novel to our previous experience.Talk of a sailor’s life being dull! Why, it’s full of incident, full of interest, full of adventure; and even on board a harbour ship, like theSaint Vincent, I tell you, there is sport to be had afloat as well as ashore!We had a rat-hunt once, some three or four weeks after I joined the ship.The captain’s dog, a fine cock-eared fox-terrier named ‘Gyp,’ with the most wonderful eyes, and a nose that worked with excitement as quickly as his short-cropped tail, which was docked to half an inch and was ever on the wag, got into the habit of coming forward on the forecastle whenever he was let out of his master’s cabin, in the most unaccountable manner.Now ‘Gyp,’ you must know, was a rather particular dog in his way, keeping to his own station when below; while, should he be taken up on the quarter-deck by the captain, or accompany any of the other officers there, he would never, as a rule, advance farther towards the fore part of the ship than the main-hatchway.All of a sudden, however, master ‘Gyp’ takes it into his head to make free of the forecastle, and associate with such of the lower deck men who might chance to be there.This, of course, was derogatory to his dignity as a captain’s dog; but, although remonstrated with by his master’s valet, who had charge of him when the captain did not take him ashore—aye, and even whipped for thus straying forwards—‘Gyp’ would persist in his unseemly predilection for low life, utterly regardless of his proper rank as an officer, with a collar and badge. This article was of gold lace, and became him well, contrasting favourably with his black-and-tan head and soft white coat, which latter was guiltless of spot or blemish.The fact was, I had better acknowledge it at once so as to preserve the poor animal’s character, which was, and is, so far as I know up to the present, as spotless as his coat, never having had a slur cast upon it, save in this one respect, that ‘Gyp,’ as the master-at-arms said, in his funny way, “smelt a mice.”Not only that, ‘Gyp’ smelt rats; and, what is more, he managed to nab one very cleverly as the rodent was leisurely hopping up the hatchway in the most free and easy manner from below, with a piece of cheese in its mouth which the beggar had appropriated from the steward’s pantry, or from the mess of some Johnny below!This happened in the afternoon, just after inspection on the upper deck and when the divisions were dispersing to their respective drills, for I was going below with some of the other chaps at the time to man the pumps on the orlop deck, the second time I had been put to this job since I had come on board, and I can’t say I liked it!Now, whether ‘Gyp’ carried the rat he had captured cosily to the captain’s quarters, or through some one taking the tale aft, I’m sure I can’t say; but, while the working party of us boys told off to clear the bilge were pumping away for dear life, and looking out for old Jellybelly, who was superintending our task, to sing out ‘spell ho!’ to give us breathing time, down comes a lot of the officers after their lunch, with the captain at the head of them, accompanied by Master ‘Gyp,’ who, somehow or other, didn’t need anybody to show him the way, though he hadn’t been below in the ship there to my knowledge before, his nose being as good as a compass, and pointing out where he thought his services might be required.“I hear, Tarbolt,” said the captain, addressing old Jellybelly by his proper name, “you have rats aboard here?”“Aye, aye, sir,” replied the quarter-master, drawing himself up sharp from the act of touching up with his cane one of the boys a little way from me, whom he fancied wasn’t putting sufficient elbow grease into his work. “I believe, sir, as how the ship reg’lerly swarms with ’em. They wore working away, sir, last night at some of the b’ys’ hammicks; and one of ’em yelled out that they was nibblin’ their toes!”“Oh!” cried the captain, “we must put a stop to that. My dog here is a good ratter, and I think he’ll be able to polish off a few for you. Where do you think, Tarbolt, the brutes hang out?”“Away forrard, sir, under some o’ that spare gear thet’s stowed there, sir; and likewise down in the bilge amongst the ballast and dunnage.”“Very good; shove your lantern, Tarbolt, over here,” said the captain, edging forwards as he spoke, with ‘Gyp’ and the rest of the officers a-following him. “Boys, you can stand off for a bit from your pumping and come and see the fun.”We didn’t need any further invitation, being only too glad to let go of the beastly crank-handles; not to speak of the interest we took in the anticipated enjoyable sport.“Hi, ‘Gyp,’ rats!” shouted the captain, when we all came up to a pile of old casks and sails in the fore peak. “Go for ’em, good dog!”The wardroom steward and the captain’s valet had come down in the rear of the officers, each of them provided with a lantern; and so, what with the lights we already had with us, the place was sufficiently illuminated for all to see the whole proceedings, which, needless to say, we witnessed with the utmost delight, Mick, who was alongside of me, staring open-mouthed, his face one broad grin from ear to ear.“Begorrah!” he whispered to me. “Sure, it bates Bannagher, an’s a’most as good as what Oi’ve heerd tell of Donnybrook Fair, in the ould toimes, from me fayther!”All we could see of ‘Gyp’ for some little time was a portion of his stern quarters, with his little butt-end of a tail wagging away at high-pressure speed, just like the escapement of a clock from which the pendulum has been temporarily taken, so that it has for the moment no check on its action.Then, all at once, with a low growl, and every individual hair on his white coat standing erect, his whole body the while quivering with excitement, ‘Gyp’ plunged forwards and disappeared into darkness, only to reappear an instant later with an enormous rat, which he had gripped in the small of the back, the vicious beast trying to worm itself round so as to tackle his nose.‘Gyp,’ however, knew a trick worth two of that, and, as he emerged into the open again, chucked the rat up aloft in the air, almost to the deck beams, and then, pouncing on it as the brute fell back under his expectant jaws, the terrier severed its head from its body with one snap!Another and another, and yet another, he served in like fashion, ferreting in amongst the dunnage, and then coming out again with a fresh victim each time; until, presently, finding their retreat ‘too warm’ for them, the rats sallied out in a crowd, skating over the deck and climbing up the bulkheads to get out of the way of their relentless enemy. The lot of us then coming to the aid of ‘Gyp,’ the captain and all catching up anything handy to have a shy at them, the family of rodents that had been having such a gay old time below for so long without interference, was soon exterminated; after which the dog and his master, with the other officers, returned to the main-deck, while we resumed our work at the pumps all the more heartily from the bit of play we had had, old Jellybelly never once grumbling again till we had done.We had a good rise out of the old quarter-master the very same evening, though, which was rather ill-natured on our part.He was on duty at the gangway, when one of the new chaps, who, like Larrikins, had a great bent for practical skylarking, went to him with a smug face, as innocent as you please.“I say, sir,” said he, in a tone of the deepest sympathy, “don’t you feel werry tired, sir, a-standing theer so long?”“Aye, my son,” replies old Jellybelly, thinking to himself, no doubt, that the chap showed wonderful good feeling for a boy; he regarding them all as a rule, not without reason probably, as imps of mischief. “It is rather tiring sometimes. I feels it in my bones and all down my legs.”“Then, sir,” rejoined the young demon, who only wanted to draw him out and laugh at him, “why doesn’t yer sit down on the rail, sir?”Of course, this would have been almost a penal offence for the quarter-master to have done, he being on duty at an appointed station; and the remark he made as his tormentor made off with a laugh, which was joined in by all the adjacent boys, was a caution.Mick, not long after this, had Mr Brown, the ship’s corporal, nicely too.He crammed his bag and a lot of other things into his blanket, which he rolled up so as to represent a sort of lay figure, stowing this into his hammock at turning-in time, just before the ‘out lights’ sounded.Keeping as grave as a judge, Mick then went up to the corporal.“If y’ playse, sor,” said he, “some gossoon or t’other, sor, has bin an’ gone an’ got into me hammick, sor, bad cess to him!”“Oh, has he, Paddy,” replied Mr Brown, switching his cane, and then drawing it as he gripped it with his right hand carefully through his left, as if feeling whether it had the right sort of edge on it or no. “I’ll soon make him shift his billet, my boy.”We, of course, were all in the joke, and watched Mr Brown with great glee as he stole stealthily up to Mick’s hammock and let fly a shower of blows on the supposed intruder’s body, accompanying the caning with some pertinent remarks of a very forcible nature anent the offender’s want of manners and unneighbourliness towards a brother shipmate; whereupon we all burst into a regular guffaw, and Mick sought refuge in flight on the exposure of his little plot before Mr Brown could pay him out.The corporal, though, took it in very good part, and did not bear my chum any subsequent ill-will for thus taking him in; albeit, he was wary enough to be on his guard against Mick hoaxing him a second time.Jokes like these came as little interludes, so to speak, to ‘ease the wheels’ of our duties, which, however, were to me, at all events, more of a pleasure than so many tasks; that is, after I had gone through the initiatory instructions and drills, and was able to hold my own with the smartest of my shipmates.I cannot say, though, that I cared much for the schooling, seven months of which every second-class boy on board theSaint Vincenthas to undergo before he can gain the first rank.Equally as certainly, however, I must allow that the teaching I gained, watch and watch about, in that big schoolroom astern on the lower deck turned out of considerable assistance to me, not only in my subsequent experience afloat in the navy, especially when serving abroad, but ashore too; for I there learnt the art of learning things, which is the great secret of education to man or boy, though we youngsters do not realise this when we have the chance of getting hold of it.But it was the seamanship instruction that I went in for with the greatest zest; and, from knotting and splicing up to compass, and helm, and signalling, I don’t think I fell far short of what Captain Mordaunt said when he persuaded father to let me go to sea and join the training-ship—that I was a born sailor and a regular ‘chip of the old block.’In connection with this, I may state, that of all the practical lessons I learnt in sailoring on board theSaint Vincent, the going aloft for sail-drill used to please me best.Every morning at eight o’clock we used to go up the rigging and practise loosing and furling the sails, crossing the royal-yards, and making all things snug before coming down on deck to our usual divisional instruction.On Mondays the whole forenoon was devoted to these evolutions, the sails being set one after the other, topsails, topgallants, royals, and even stu’nsails sometimes, besides the courses and headsails below; until, often, the whole ship was piled with canvas as if she were fetching down Channel on a cruise, her spars quivering with the strain frequently, when we had the wind abeam from the southward and east’ard, and every rope as taut as a bar of iron!We used to work our way from the lower yards to the dignity of the upper by rotation more than through any special smartness and activity; and I know I was as pleased as Punch when it came to my turn to be an ‘upper-yard boy.’I was never so happy as when aloft; and many a time up there of a morning have I gazed out to seaward, looking over Southsea beach and the boats clustered in the fairway, that seemed but little dots from the height where I was, to the open stretch of water beyond Spithead and Saint Helens, that seemed to draw my heart to it like a magnet, making me long to leave my present stay at home surroundings and sail away and away on the boundless deep.This desire of mine was gratified in part after I had been serving for nine months as a second-class boy, and passed satisfactorily through all my drills and instructions; when Mick and I got promoted.Strangely enough, my chum the Irish lad proved himself, landsman though he had been before and never having even smelt the sea prior to his coming to Portsmouth, quite as expert as myself after a short stay aboard the training-ship; though I had been associated with ships and seafaring folk from the time I drew my first breath, and indeed, like all the Bowlings, as I told you at the beginning of my yarn, was born with the taste for ‘the briny,’ the feeling being inherent to my blood.It strikes me, though, that my sister Jenny had something to do with this.Mick heard her say the first day when I first took him home with me to visit father and mother at Bonfire Corner, that she loved sailors, and wondered how any young fellow could possibly care for anything else, when he had a chance of going afloat and serving his Queen and country, and fighting the battles of Old England.The remark was a chance one; but, though Mick must have heard Jenny say a good many other things, for he was often at our house afterwards, being generally in the habit of accompanying me home when I had leave to go, he never forgot those words and somehow or other seemed to strive his best to reach Jenny’s ideal.So, you see, smart seaman though I fancied myself to be even at that early age, I had to look out lest I should be supplanted by my own chum; for no sooner did I get the start of him in one thing than he would fetch alongside of me and be working ahead before I well knew where I was, the ‘owdacious young beggar,’ as father dubbed him, becoming actually a ‘royal-yard boy’ the following week to myself, while both of us, as I have said, were made first-class boys together.Unfortunately, this was during the winter months; and, as the training-brigMartin, which is attached to theSaint Vincentas a sea-going tender in order to cruise about in the Channel to give the boys practical experience of their profession—like a frolicsome chick hanging round a broody old hen that won’t leave her nest—does not go out of harbour till the spring, Mick and I were unable for some time to take advantage of the grand privilege of our rise and really go to sea.We thought the blissful period would never come.But ‘it’s a long lane that knows no turning’; and, winter ebbing away into the flood of spring anon, we, with some ninety and nine other youngsters of the same standing, set sail one fine April morning from Portsmouth Harbour, theMartinslipping her buoy abreast of Blockhouse Fort, and standing out into the Solent under easy canvas, with a fair wind from the nor’-east.A hundred boys are always taken at a time for a month’s cruise in the brig, the lot being accompanied by some of the smartest seamen belonging to the complement of the mother training-ship, so that they have every opportunity of picking up now the nautical knowledge necessary to make them worth their salt, in reference both to seamanship and gunnery.We had a pretty fair knock-about time in the Channel, running down to Plymouth and back, having a ‘sojer’s wind,’ one that was fair both ways, out and home again; and, though, from this fact, we necessarily made an easy passage of it, some of the boys were woefully seasick, many of them never having been at sea before.Notably among these was Mick.“Bedad!” moaned he, leaning over the side with his dark face turned to pale green that seemed a faint reflection of the water below, into which he looked apparently with the deepest interest as he sacrificed his dearly loved dinner to Neptune, paying the sea-god his dues, “Oi fale, Tom me darlint, as if Oi’d brought up iverythink, faith, since furst Oi jined the ship, an’ me boots, begorrah, same in the back of me hid! Wurrah, wurrah, why did Oi ivver come to say? Och, Tom mabouchal, kill me at onst, and be done with it!”I could not help laughing at him, he presented such a contrast to the buoyant lad of my ordinary acquaintance; though, of course, I tried to sympathise with my woe-begone chum.But ere long something occurred which made him, and the others in a like predicament, forget their seasickness in a hurry, all of us having to be as spry as we could.TheMartintook the ground!I’ll tell you how this happened.We had run up Channel, as I have told you, with a fair wind from the start; but, on our reaching the westernmost end of the Isle of Wight, this turned against us, so that after passing through the Needles we had to beat up the Solent in the teeth of a stiff sou’-easter.This, of course, gave us plenty of exercise in tacking; and the constant going aloft, with the brig rolling and a choppy sea under her, had overset the equilibrium of poor Mick’s stomach.We had tacked and ‘reached’ in this way for some time, making short boards between the Hampshire coast and the Island opposite; when, in going about off the Brambles, through one of the uncertain currents which infest Southampton Water taking her on the slant as we shivered our headsails to come up to the wind, the brig missed stays and struck on the edge of the shoal.

Our life aboard after this passed very evenly, though not uneventfully; for there was hardly a day that something did not occur as interesting as it was novel to our previous experience.

Talk of a sailor’s life being dull! Why, it’s full of incident, full of interest, full of adventure; and even on board a harbour ship, like theSaint Vincent, I tell you, there is sport to be had afloat as well as ashore!

We had a rat-hunt once, some three or four weeks after I joined the ship.

The captain’s dog, a fine cock-eared fox-terrier named ‘Gyp,’ with the most wonderful eyes, and a nose that worked with excitement as quickly as his short-cropped tail, which was docked to half an inch and was ever on the wag, got into the habit of coming forward on the forecastle whenever he was let out of his master’s cabin, in the most unaccountable manner.

Now ‘Gyp,’ you must know, was a rather particular dog in his way, keeping to his own station when below; while, should he be taken up on the quarter-deck by the captain, or accompany any of the other officers there, he would never, as a rule, advance farther towards the fore part of the ship than the main-hatchway.

All of a sudden, however, master ‘Gyp’ takes it into his head to make free of the forecastle, and associate with such of the lower deck men who might chance to be there.

This, of course, was derogatory to his dignity as a captain’s dog; but, although remonstrated with by his master’s valet, who had charge of him when the captain did not take him ashore—aye, and even whipped for thus straying forwards—‘Gyp’ would persist in his unseemly predilection for low life, utterly regardless of his proper rank as an officer, with a collar and badge. This article was of gold lace, and became him well, contrasting favourably with his black-and-tan head and soft white coat, which latter was guiltless of spot or blemish.

The fact was, I had better acknowledge it at once so as to preserve the poor animal’s character, which was, and is, so far as I know up to the present, as spotless as his coat, never having had a slur cast upon it, save in this one respect, that ‘Gyp,’ as the master-at-arms said, in his funny way, “smelt a mice.”

Not only that, ‘Gyp’ smelt rats; and, what is more, he managed to nab one very cleverly as the rodent was leisurely hopping up the hatchway in the most free and easy manner from below, with a piece of cheese in its mouth which the beggar had appropriated from the steward’s pantry, or from the mess of some Johnny below!

This happened in the afternoon, just after inspection on the upper deck and when the divisions were dispersing to their respective drills, for I was going below with some of the other chaps at the time to man the pumps on the orlop deck, the second time I had been put to this job since I had come on board, and I can’t say I liked it!

Now, whether ‘Gyp’ carried the rat he had captured cosily to the captain’s quarters, or through some one taking the tale aft, I’m sure I can’t say; but, while the working party of us boys told off to clear the bilge were pumping away for dear life, and looking out for old Jellybelly, who was superintending our task, to sing out ‘spell ho!’ to give us breathing time, down comes a lot of the officers after their lunch, with the captain at the head of them, accompanied by Master ‘Gyp,’ who, somehow or other, didn’t need anybody to show him the way, though he hadn’t been below in the ship there to my knowledge before, his nose being as good as a compass, and pointing out where he thought his services might be required.

“I hear, Tarbolt,” said the captain, addressing old Jellybelly by his proper name, “you have rats aboard here?”

“Aye, aye, sir,” replied the quarter-master, drawing himself up sharp from the act of touching up with his cane one of the boys a little way from me, whom he fancied wasn’t putting sufficient elbow grease into his work. “I believe, sir, as how the ship reg’lerly swarms with ’em. They wore working away, sir, last night at some of the b’ys’ hammicks; and one of ’em yelled out that they was nibblin’ their toes!”

“Oh!” cried the captain, “we must put a stop to that. My dog here is a good ratter, and I think he’ll be able to polish off a few for you. Where do you think, Tarbolt, the brutes hang out?”

“Away forrard, sir, under some o’ that spare gear thet’s stowed there, sir; and likewise down in the bilge amongst the ballast and dunnage.”

“Very good; shove your lantern, Tarbolt, over here,” said the captain, edging forwards as he spoke, with ‘Gyp’ and the rest of the officers a-following him. “Boys, you can stand off for a bit from your pumping and come and see the fun.”

We didn’t need any further invitation, being only too glad to let go of the beastly crank-handles; not to speak of the interest we took in the anticipated enjoyable sport.

“Hi, ‘Gyp,’ rats!” shouted the captain, when we all came up to a pile of old casks and sails in the fore peak. “Go for ’em, good dog!”

The wardroom steward and the captain’s valet had come down in the rear of the officers, each of them provided with a lantern; and so, what with the lights we already had with us, the place was sufficiently illuminated for all to see the whole proceedings, which, needless to say, we witnessed with the utmost delight, Mick, who was alongside of me, staring open-mouthed, his face one broad grin from ear to ear.

“Begorrah!” he whispered to me. “Sure, it bates Bannagher, an’s a’most as good as what Oi’ve heerd tell of Donnybrook Fair, in the ould toimes, from me fayther!”

All we could see of ‘Gyp’ for some little time was a portion of his stern quarters, with his little butt-end of a tail wagging away at high-pressure speed, just like the escapement of a clock from which the pendulum has been temporarily taken, so that it has for the moment no check on its action.

Then, all at once, with a low growl, and every individual hair on his white coat standing erect, his whole body the while quivering with excitement, ‘Gyp’ plunged forwards and disappeared into darkness, only to reappear an instant later with an enormous rat, which he had gripped in the small of the back, the vicious beast trying to worm itself round so as to tackle his nose.

‘Gyp,’ however, knew a trick worth two of that, and, as he emerged into the open again, chucked the rat up aloft in the air, almost to the deck beams, and then, pouncing on it as the brute fell back under his expectant jaws, the terrier severed its head from its body with one snap!

Another and another, and yet another, he served in like fashion, ferreting in amongst the dunnage, and then coming out again with a fresh victim each time; until, presently, finding their retreat ‘too warm’ for them, the rats sallied out in a crowd, skating over the deck and climbing up the bulkheads to get out of the way of their relentless enemy. The lot of us then coming to the aid of ‘Gyp,’ the captain and all catching up anything handy to have a shy at them, the family of rodents that had been having such a gay old time below for so long without interference, was soon exterminated; after which the dog and his master, with the other officers, returned to the main-deck, while we resumed our work at the pumps all the more heartily from the bit of play we had had, old Jellybelly never once grumbling again till we had done.

We had a good rise out of the old quarter-master the very same evening, though, which was rather ill-natured on our part.

He was on duty at the gangway, when one of the new chaps, who, like Larrikins, had a great bent for practical skylarking, went to him with a smug face, as innocent as you please.

“I say, sir,” said he, in a tone of the deepest sympathy, “don’t you feel werry tired, sir, a-standing theer so long?”

“Aye, my son,” replies old Jellybelly, thinking to himself, no doubt, that the chap showed wonderful good feeling for a boy; he regarding them all as a rule, not without reason probably, as imps of mischief. “It is rather tiring sometimes. I feels it in my bones and all down my legs.”

“Then, sir,” rejoined the young demon, who only wanted to draw him out and laugh at him, “why doesn’t yer sit down on the rail, sir?”

Of course, this would have been almost a penal offence for the quarter-master to have done, he being on duty at an appointed station; and the remark he made as his tormentor made off with a laugh, which was joined in by all the adjacent boys, was a caution.

Mick, not long after this, had Mr Brown, the ship’s corporal, nicely too.

He crammed his bag and a lot of other things into his blanket, which he rolled up so as to represent a sort of lay figure, stowing this into his hammock at turning-in time, just before the ‘out lights’ sounded.

Keeping as grave as a judge, Mick then went up to the corporal.

“If y’ playse, sor,” said he, “some gossoon or t’other, sor, has bin an’ gone an’ got into me hammick, sor, bad cess to him!”

“Oh, has he, Paddy,” replied Mr Brown, switching his cane, and then drawing it as he gripped it with his right hand carefully through his left, as if feeling whether it had the right sort of edge on it or no. “I’ll soon make him shift his billet, my boy.”

We, of course, were all in the joke, and watched Mr Brown with great glee as he stole stealthily up to Mick’s hammock and let fly a shower of blows on the supposed intruder’s body, accompanying the caning with some pertinent remarks of a very forcible nature anent the offender’s want of manners and unneighbourliness towards a brother shipmate; whereupon we all burst into a regular guffaw, and Mick sought refuge in flight on the exposure of his little plot before Mr Brown could pay him out.

The corporal, though, took it in very good part, and did not bear my chum any subsequent ill-will for thus taking him in; albeit, he was wary enough to be on his guard against Mick hoaxing him a second time.

Jokes like these came as little interludes, so to speak, to ‘ease the wheels’ of our duties, which, however, were to me, at all events, more of a pleasure than so many tasks; that is, after I had gone through the initiatory instructions and drills, and was able to hold my own with the smartest of my shipmates.

I cannot say, though, that I cared much for the schooling, seven months of which every second-class boy on board theSaint Vincenthas to undergo before he can gain the first rank.

Equally as certainly, however, I must allow that the teaching I gained, watch and watch about, in that big schoolroom astern on the lower deck turned out of considerable assistance to me, not only in my subsequent experience afloat in the navy, especially when serving abroad, but ashore too; for I there learnt the art of learning things, which is the great secret of education to man or boy, though we youngsters do not realise this when we have the chance of getting hold of it.

But it was the seamanship instruction that I went in for with the greatest zest; and, from knotting and splicing up to compass, and helm, and signalling, I don’t think I fell far short of what Captain Mordaunt said when he persuaded father to let me go to sea and join the training-ship—that I was a born sailor and a regular ‘chip of the old block.’

In connection with this, I may state, that of all the practical lessons I learnt in sailoring on board theSaint Vincent, the going aloft for sail-drill used to please me best.

Every morning at eight o’clock we used to go up the rigging and practise loosing and furling the sails, crossing the royal-yards, and making all things snug before coming down on deck to our usual divisional instruction.

On Mondays the whole forenoon was devoted to these evolutions, the sails being set one after the other, topsails, topgallants, royals, and even stu’nsails sometimes, besides the courses and headsails below; until, often, the whole ship was piled with canvas as if she were fetching down Channel on a cruise, her spars quivering with the strain frequently, when we had the wind abeam from the southward and east’ard, and every rope as taut as a bar of iron!

We used to work our way from the lower yards to the dignity of the upper by rotation more than through any special smartness and activity; and I know I was as pleased as Punch when it came to my turn to be an ‘upper-yard boy.’

I was never so happy as when aloft; and many a time up there of a morning have I gazed out to seaward, looking over Southsea beach and the boats clustered in the fairway, that seemed but little dots from the height where I was, to the open stretch of water beyond Spithead and Saint Helens, that seemed to draw my heart to it like a magnet, making me long to leave my present stay at home surroundings and sail away and away on the boundless deep.

This desire of mine was gratified in part after I had been serving for nine months as a second-class boy, and passed satisfactorily through all my drills and instructions; when Mick and I got promoted.

Strangely enough, my chum the Irish lad proved himself, landsman though he had been before and never having even smelt the sea prior to his coming to Portsmouth, quite as expert as myself after a short stay aboard the training-ship; though I had been associated with ships and seafaring folk from the time I drew my first breath, and indeed, like all the Bowlings, as I told you at the beginning of my yarn, was born with the taste for ‘the briny,’ the feeling being inherent to my blood.

It strikes me, though, that my sister Jenny had something to do with this.

Mick heard her say the first day when I first took him home with me to visit father and mother at Bonfire Corner, that she loved sailors, and wondered how any young fellow could possibly care for anything else, when he had a chance of going afloat and serving his Queen and country, and fighting the battles of Old England.

The remark was a chance one; but, though Mick must have heard Jenny say a good many other things, for he was often at our house afterwards, being generally in the habit of accompanying me home when I had leave to go, he never forgot those words and somehow or other seemed to strive his best to reach Jenny’s ideal.

So, you see, smart seaman though I fancied myself to be even at that early age, I had to look out lest I should be supplanted by my own chum; for no sooner did I get the start of him in one thing than he would fetch alongside of me and be working ahead before I well knew where I was, the ‘owdacious young beggar,’ as father dubbed him, becoming actually a ‘royal-yard boy’ the following week to myself, while both of us, as I have said, were made first-class boys together.

Unfortunately, this was during the winter months; and, as the training-brigMartin, which is attached to theSaint Vincentas a sea-going tender in order to cruise about in the Channel to give the boys practical experience of their profession—like a frolicsome chick hanging round a broody old hen that won’t leave her nest—does not go out of harbour till the spring, Mick and I were unable for some time to take advantage of the grand privilege of our rise and really go to sea.

We thought the blissful period would never come.

But ‘it’s a long lane that knows no turning’; and, winter ebbing away into the flood of spring anon, we, with some ninety and nine other youngsters of the same standing, set sail one fine April morning from Portsmouth Harbour, theMartinslipping her buoy abreast of Blockhouse Fort, and standing out into the Solent under easy canvas, with a fair wind from the nor’-east.

A hundred boys are always taken at a time for a month’s cruise in the brig, the lot being accompanied by some of the smartest seamen belonging to the complement of the mother training-ship, so that they have every opportunity of picking up now the nautical knowledge necessary to make them worth their salt, in reference both to seamanship and gunnery.

We had a pretty fair knock-about time in the Channel, running down to Plymouth and back, having a ‘sojer’s wind,’ one that was fair both ways, out and home again; and, though, from this fact, we necessarily made an easy passage of it, some of the boys were woefully seasick, many of them never having been at sea before.

Notably among these was Mick.

“Bedad!” moaned he, leaning over the side with his dark face turned to pale green that seemed a faint reflection of the water below, into which he looked apparently with the deepest interest as he sacrificed his dearly loved dinner to Neptune, paying the sea-god his dues, “Oi fale, Tom me darlint, as if Oi’d brought up iverythink, faith, since furst Oi jined the ship, an’ me boots, begorrah, same in the back of me hid! Wurrah, wurrah, why did Oi ivver come to say? Och, Tom mabouchal, kill me at onst, and be done with it!”

I could not help laughing at him, he presented such a contrast to the buoyant lad of my ordinary acquaintance; though, of course, I tried to sympathise with my woe-begone chum.

But ere long something occurred which made him, and the others in a like predicament, forget their seasickness in a hurry, all of us having to be as spry as we could.

TheMartintook the ground!

I’ll tell you how this happened.

We had run up Channel, as I have told you, with a fair wind from the start; but, on our reaching the westernmost end of the Isle of Wight, this turned against us, so that after passing through the Needles we had to beat up the Solent in the teeth of a stiff sou’-easter.

This, of course, gave us plenty of exercise in tacking; and the constant going aloft, with the brig rolling and a choppy sea under her, had overset the equilibrium of poor Mick’s stomach.

We had tacked and ‘reached’ in this way for some time, making short boards between the Hampshire coast and the Island opposite; when, in going about off the Brambles, through one of the uncertain currents which infest Southampton Water taking her on the slant as we shivered our headsails to come up to the wind, the brig missed stays and struck on the edge of the shoal.

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