"Crown and Anchor" (continued 3)

“Of course not, Mr Bitpin,” said Commander Nesbitt, amused at this unexpected piece of good nature from one who very seldom put himself out for anybody. “It does not matter in the least; but, I told Jellaby I wished to shorten in cable as soon as the decks were washed down.”

“He didn’t tell me anything about that, sir, when he came on board this morning; for I met him at the gangway,” growled out the crusty lieutenant in his usual surly way. “He was full of some Miss Thingamy’s dancing and made me sick by telling me at least twenty times over what a ‘chawming gurl’ she was!”

“No doubt of that. He’s a rare chap amongst the ladies, is our friend Jellaby!” said Commander Nesbitt laughing at Mr Bitpin’s imitation of Joe’s favourite expression. “We must see now, though, about shortening in without any further delay, for time’s getting on.”

“Very good, sir,” replied the lieutenant, dropping his unwonted jocularity and relapsing into his matter-of-fact official manner. “I’d better go on the fo’c’s’le and join Mr Morgan, the mate of the watch, who’s already there.”

“Thank you, Mr Bitpin,” briefly said the commander by way of dismissal; and then, bending over the poop-rail, he called out, “Bosun’s mate! Pipe all hands to shorten cable!”

“Ay, ay, sir,” answered the petty officer addressed, putting his whistle to his mouth and blowing a shrill, ear-piercing call that echoed through the ship and was taken up by his brother mates below on the main and lower decks, whose voices could be heard, in every key, gruffly shouting out fore and aft, until the sound gradually died away in the distant recesses of the hold, “All hands, shorten cable!”

Immediately, as if touched by an enchanter’s wand, the quiet that had reigned on board since the decks had been washed down disappeared, and all was bustle and apparent confusion; although, it need hardly be said, order was paramount everywhere.

Such, indeed, is always on board a man-of-war, where each man knows his place and takes care to be in it as quickly as he can; especially when “all hands” are called as in the present instance.

In this case, as now, all the crew turn out and come on deck to their stations, whether it be their watch below or not.

Up, therefore, tumbled the men of the starboard watch, who had only been relieved from duty an hour before, at the same time I was first roused out by the obliging Dick Andrews.

After the men, but a little more leisurely, came the other officers not already on deck.

Amongst these were, the Honourable Digby Lanyard, our swell first lieutenant, eyeglass in eye as usual, and dressed as neatly as if going to divisions, although he had only such very short notice for his toilet; Joe Jellaby, the proper officer of my watch, whose place Mr Bitpin had taken for the nonce, rubbing his eyes and only half awake from his dreams of “that chawming gurl” at the admiral’s ball; Charley Gilham, our third lieutenant, a manly, blue-eyed sailor and fond of his profession, but no bookworm and bad at head-work; Mr Cheffinch, or “Gunnery Jack” as he was styled; the three other mates; and, all the middies and cadets, including Larkyns.

The latter was wroth at his ante-prandial snooze being so suddenly cut short; while Andrews, who followed in his rear, was savage at meeting his late antagonist so soon again, his friendly feelings towards whom were not increased by the foot of Larkyns giving him a “lift” up the hatchway as the pair scrambled on deck together, the cadet, unfortunately for himself, being a trifle ahead of the midshipman.

The first lieutenant, or “glass-eye” as the men called him, went out at once on the forecastle, where a number of the hands, under the superintendence of Mr Hawser, the boatswain, were already engaged rigging the fish davit and overhauling the anchor gear, with Mr Bitpin and Morgan looking on to see that everything was done properly.

“Charley” Gilham, and “Gunnery Jack,” stopped down on the main deck to look after the capstan, which was soon surrounded by a squad of “jollies” under the command of one of the marine officers, Lieutenant Wagstaff, a fellow as tall as a maypole and with a headpiece of very similar material!

Mr Jellaby, however, not knowing where his deputy, Mr Bitpin, might be, came up on the quarter-deck; but he had no sooner appeared there than the commander despatched him to another station.

“Please go down at once to the lower deck, Mr Jellaby,” said he, on catching sight of him. “I want you to attend to the working of the cables. See how smart you can be with those new hands we have from the foretop!”

“Very good, sir,” replied “Joe,” all on the alert in an instant. “I will go down directly.”

Away he accordingly went; whereupon, I, having nothing special to do, and seeing everyone else appointed to some station or other, was just scuttling down the hatchway after him when the Commander called me back.

“Stop here, Mr Vernon,” he cried. “I want you to act as my messenger again. Try if you can be as useful as the one they have to bring in the cable with. I suppose you know what sort of ‘messenger’ that is, eh?”

“Oh, yes, sir,” I replied glibly enough. “It is a species of endless chain, passing round the base of the capstan amidships, and through a stationary block called a ‘controller’ on the forepart of the lower deck, to which the cable is attached by nippers as it comes through the hawse-hole inboard; and, as the capstan is hove round, the messenger drags the cable up, the nippers being released and taken forward again to get a fresh grip, while the slack of the cable passes down the deck pipes into the cable lockers below, sir.”

“Very well answered, youngster,” said Commander Nesbitt, approvingly, when I had reeled off this long yarn. “But, I think, it’s about time for Mr Jellaby to give us the signal for heaving round now.”

He liked things done smartly, did the commander, for he knew how they should be done; and, being prompt and ready in his own actions, judged others by himself.

Barely five minutes had elapsed since “all hands” had been piped, and in that interval the cable had to be unbitted and the “slip” stopping it to the deck knocked off by the blacksmith.

In addition to this, the messenger had to be brought up to the unbitted end and the nippers gripped on before those working the capstan on the main deck above could commence heaving round in order to “bring in the shekels, like unto the Israelites of old and the Hebrews of the present day,” as Master Larkyns explained to me later; and yet, the commander grew impatient at the delay, in spite of all this having to be done in such a short space of time.

But, at last, the signal was given.

“Heave round!” snouted Mr Jellaby from the extreme fore-end of the lower deck, where he had been bustling up the topmen and seeing to the messenger being properly attached to the cable.

“Heave round,” also cried Sylvester, one of the midshipmen with him.

“Heave round,” repeated the boatswain’s mate further aft; while his fellow mates stationed along the hatchways above passed on the cry, till it reached the commander on the poop, who in his full-toned voice now transformed what was merely a signal that all was ready into an order.

This gave the required impetus to the working party on the main deck, who were waiting for this order, really to “Heave round!”

At once, the drummer and bugler, in attendance on the eager marines and after-guard, struck up with fife and drum the festive strains of “Judy Calaghan,” which Corporal Macan said “did his sowl good to hear, faith!”

Then, the bars having been previously shipped by Mr Cleete, the carpenter and his crew, round tramped the “jollies,” round went the capstan; and, with it, the messenger, the endless chain of which, revolving slowly, hauled the cable foot by foot inboard, the “lengths” dropping down the deck pipes out of the way as the slack was released from the messenger, and the nippers passed forwards again; and so on, over and over again!

I had ample opportunity for noticing this, the commander sending me on another errand down to the scene of operations almost as soon as the drumming and fifing began. This was much to my delight; for I enjoyed the strains of the jolly air played as much as Corporal Macan, as well as the steady tramp of the marines and after-guard round the capstan, the men stamping on the deck in time to the music, as if they would smash through the planking.

“Go and tell Mr Jellaby,” said he, “to shorten in to two shackles.”

“Ay, ay, sir.”

With which response to Commander Nesbitt’s order, I sprang down the after-hatchway on to the main deck, proceeding thence below to where old “Joe” and his topmen were working.

Of course I gave the lieutenant the mandate with which I had been charged; but I remaining, boylike, to watch what was going on, the commander not having told me to return immediately, though I ought to have done so.

The capstan, however, was spun round so merrily by the marines while the nippers, in the hands of the active seamen, passed so freely; that, ere I knew how far the task had progressed, so as to be able to report to the commander the state of things, Mr Jellaby suddenly sang out “Belay!”

Instantly, the word being passed by the boatswain’s mates as before, so that the order reached the lieutenant in charge of the working party at the capstan above almost as soon as Mr Jellaby sang out from the lower deck forward, the music stopped suddenly, as if the drummer and fifer had both been shot on the spot.

With it, too, ceased the monotonous tramp, tramp, tramp of the men above our heads, which sounded through the thickness of the deck like a band of Ethiopian minstrels dancing a flap dance and marching “round the mulberry bush” afterwards, to “show their muscle,” as is the wont of these negro “entertainers,” so-called!

“You may go up now to the commander,” said Mr Jellaby to me, as a polite hint to be off, “and tell him that the second shackle’s just inside our hawse.”

“Very good, sir,” I replied, moving away as the blacksmith went to put the slip on the cable to secure it from running out until we were ready to weigh anchor later on. “I’ll tell him at once, sir.”

“All right,” said Commander Nesbitt, when I reached the poop and repeated Mr Jellaby’s message, the import of which he already knew from the stoppage of all movement below, and the report of the boatswain from the forecastle that the anchor was “a short stay apeak”; when, advancing to the rail, he called out in a louder key, “Bosun’s mate, pipe the hands to breakfast!”

Chapter Twelve.

Below in the Gunroom.

“Well!” exclaimed little Tommy Mills, a little later, when he and I, with young Morgan, the mate and Ned Anstruther, on being relieved by the starboard watch, all went down to the gunroom and sat down to have our breakfast, “I call this a beastly shame.”

“Hullo,” said Popplethorne, one of the other middies, looking up from the plate on which he was busily engaged; while several other fellows, similarly employed ceased operations likewise, staring at Tommy in astonishment. “What’s up?”

“Nothing’s up, but everything seems down,” replied my little chum in an aggrieved tone. “I don’t see a crumb left for a poor, hungry chap; no bloaters, no marmalade, no nothing. When I was in the Illustrious, if they did grind a fellow a bit, one always had something decent to eat, at all events!”

“First come, first served,” mumbled Phil Plumper, the senior mate of our watch, who had his mouth full and was tucking in some species of “burgoo,” or porridge with much gusto. He was an awfully fat fellow and looked just like a boiled lobster bursting out of its shell, for the buttons of his jacket were continually carrying away at odd moments. “If you don’t look out for yourself on board ship you’ll find nobody ’ll look after you; and, you’ll come off minus!”

“That’ll never be your case,” retorted Tommy, with a snigger. “Judging by appearances, I should say your condition represents a plus quantity!”

“Beg pardon, sir,” apologised Dobbs, the gunroom steward, who from his comical little screwed-up eyes and manner must have been first cousin to my old friend the waiter at the “Keppel’s Head,” noticing the disdainful expression with which Tommy Mills continued to glance round the empty table, seeking in vain something appetising in the way of food for his hungry eye to rest upon,—“Beg pardon, sir, but the bumboat woman didn’t come off this morning. Sunday, you know, sir.”

“That’s all gammon, steward,” said Master Tommy, still looking about here and there and finding nothing but a desert of empty dishes and dirty plates. “You ought to have sent one of the ship’s boats ashore if you didn’t have enough on board for everybody in the mess. Our steward in the Illustrious always kept a good look out and sent himself for them when the things were not brought off in time. Why didn’t you do the same?”

“I’m sure I’m werry sorry, sir,” answered Dobbs, humbly, awed by the way in which little Tommy spoke to him; for my old comrade, I noticed, had lost none of his cheek since our separation, and now put on the air of a post captain at the least. “Begging y’r pardon, sir, but getting ashore from Spithead, with a northerly wind a-blowin’, ain’t quite so easy as landing from Point and you’re moored over against Blockhouse Fort!”

“That may be, but it’s none of my business,” said young Mills, loftily, waiving Dobbs’s plea aside as a mere trivial matter. “I want some breakfast. What have you at all fit for a christian to eat? I see nothing here, nothing at all.”

“Got some werry nice cold ’am, sir, in my pantry,” cried Dobbs, with effusion, at this opening, glad of having something he could offer. “Shall I cut you a plate o’ that, sir—just try a wee bit off the knuckle end, sir?”

“All right, if there is nothing else, but I suppose it will be all bone and gristle, or as hard as a cat-block,” replied Tommy; heaving a most portentous sigh of disappointment, though winking slily to me to show that he was only ‘putting all this on’ to astonish the other fellows, who were gazing at him with open mouths in wonder at his assurance and grand seigneur manner. “You may get me a couple of eggs, also, while you’re about it, steward. Mind they’re fresh and have no chickens in them; I don’t like poultry in the morning so early!”

Of course there was a loud guffaw at this, the three purser’s clerks, who were eating bread and butter at the lower end of the table, not daring to put in a word of objection to the fare, seeming to enjoy the joke mightily.

Not so, however, Dobbs.

“Werry sorry, sir, but there’s no heggs,” he replied to this somewhat imperative order from Master Tommy, looking absolutely crestfallen at having thus to confess the shortcomings of his commissariat. “The caterer of the mess, sir, forgot to horder ’em, sir.”

“No eggs!” cried Tommy, in the tone of tragic denunciation which Cicero might have used when exposing the iniquities of Cataline. “This is really impardonable!”

“Never mind, sir,” hastily whispered Dobbs, holding out a gleam of hope, as he thought, “we’ll get some at Plymouth as soon as we anchor in the Sound, sir. You shall get some there, sir, never you fear, sir.”

“Plymouth? Why, I may lose the number of my mess myself long before I ever reach there!” said Tommy, contemptuously. “A caterer who forgets to provide eggs for the mess ought to be keel-hauled! Who is the caterer, steward?”

“Mr Stormcock, sir.”

“Oh, indeed! Stormcock, eh?” repeated little Mills, making me choke with suppressed laughter. “Then you can tell Mister Stormcock, with my compliments, that unless he looks after the mess catering better, he’ll precious soon find himself in foul weather with me!”

“Highty, tighty, my young bantam!” cried out the gentleman in question, the master’s mate, a thick-set, full-grown fellow, old enough to be Tommy’s father, who happened to be stretched at full length on one of the lockers at the further end of the gunroom, and was roused from his nap on hearing his name mentioned. “You seem to have a pretty considerable stock of impudence of your own for so young a shaver, and crow so loudly you must want to have your comb cut, I think!”

“Not to-day, thank you, sir, all the same,” answered Master Tommy, demurely, but with a grimace that made us all laugh. “If I’m a shaver, of course I can cut it myself, can’t I?”

“Hang me, but you are a cheeky young beggar, the cheekiest we have on board, I think, and that’s saying a good deal!” ejaculated the other, utterly dumbfounded at his effrontery. “What are you rowing the poor steward about, eh?”

“Nothing—only I thought we might have had a better spread for breakfast than I see on the table as we’re not yet at sea, that’s all!”

“Oh, that’s all, is it, young gentleman?” cried the master’s mate, not liking to hear his catering criticised so frankly. “I’m sorry you didn’t let us know we had a lord coming aboard; for, if we had heard in time, we’d have hired a French cook and laid in every delicacy you could desire. By jingo! when I was a youngster and joined my ship for the first time, I remember, I was glad enough to get a mouthful of salt junk and hard tack, without any of your bloaters and marmalade and foreign kickshaws—ay, and thought myself doocid lucky, I can tell you, if I didn’t get a thrashing from one of the oldsters in the mess, if I grumbled, to make me relish my grub the better. Things are coming to a pretty pass nowadays for a young jackanapes to growl about his vittles and call his seniors to account!”

“Pardon me, sir, but my name is Tom Mills, not ‘Jack Napes,’” said my cheeky chum, with meek subservience; and, turning then to Dobbs, he called out, “a cup of tea, please, steward, with plenty of milk in it.”

“Werry sorry, sir, but there ain’t no milk,” replied Dobbs, still more apologetically, at this further demand which he was unable to supply, as if he grieved from his inmost heart thereat. “Mr Jones ’as ’ad the werry last drop, sir.”

“We’ll send ashore for a cow for you, Master Impudence,” put in Mr Stormcock, ironically, before Tom could say anything. “Just wait a bit for your breakfast till we can get it off. Dobbs, you know the sort of cow the young gentleman wants—one with an iron tail!”

“Did I ever tell you that yarn about a cow we had on board the Duke, eh?” observed a tall gentleman with long whiskers, regular “weepers” of the Dundreary type, who was seated on another locker at the after end of the gunroom, right opposite to the irascible master’s mate. “I mean the cow old Charley Napier took with him in his flagship when we went up the Baltic?”

“Good Lord! Jones, don’t get your jaw tacks aboard now,” cried Mr Stormcock, as I pricked up my ears on hearing the name of Sir Charles Napier, Dad’s old captain. “We’ve heard that yarn of yours three times at least since we started fitting out; and, I’m hanged if it’ll stand telling again!”

“Oh, very well, then,” said the whiskered gentleman in a displeased tone. He wore a plain undress sort of uniform, I noticed, and Dobbs, the steward, told me he was the paymaster’s assistant and kept the ship’s books; though, he messed in the gunroom with all the midshipmen and cadets, like the master’s mate, both of them seeming to my mind far too old to associate on such a footing with a parcel of boys like ourselves. “I may as well spare my breath to cool my porridge! I assure you, Mr Stormcock, I have no wish to bore you.”

“Do tell us about the cow, sir,” I interposed anxiously, afraid he would not continue his story. “I have often heard Dad, I mean my father, speak about Admiral Napier; and, I saw him myself when I was in London last summer. It was he who got me my nomination for a cadetship.”

“Ah, then you know what a queer old customer he is?” went on Mr Jones, evidently mollified by the interest I took in his yarn. “It isn’t much of a story, as Mr Stormcock appears to think; but, if you care to hear it, I’ll tell you all about it.”

“I do care, sir,” I replied, “very much indeed, sir.”

“Well, then, youngster,” he proceeded, “the Baltic fleet was lying at Spithead, where we mustered, you must know, before sailing up the North Sea; and one fine day, when we were about to weigh anchor for the Queen to review us as she passed us in the royal yacht, up comes the dockyard tug alongside, with ‘Sally,’ that was the admiral’s daughter, bringing along with her the old ship’s cow and pigeons and a lot of other stock he had ordered from his place t’other side of Portsdown Hill on the road to Petersfield, ‘Merchiston Hall,’ I think he called it, or some other Scotch name sounding like that.”

“Oh, yes,” put in Mr Stormcock, satirically—“I recollect it all quite well. Heave ahead, my hearty!”

The assistant-paymaster, however, took no notice whatever of the interruption, pursuing the even tenor of his narrative.

“The admiral had the cow and stock taken in; but just as his daughter Sally was coming across the gangway, he ordered her back, for the royal yacht was now coming up. ‘Stop where you are, Sally!’ he shouted out from the poop. ‘Stop, Sally, stop!’ bawling out the words so loudly that you could have heard him in Common Hard, for he had a powerful pair of lungs had Old Charley, and could raise his voice above a gale. Almost in the same breath, too, he sang out to the wives and friends of the sailors who had come out from Portsmouth to wish them good-bye, ‘Now, all you women and people there! go aboard the tug with my darter, and when Her Majesty has passed you may come back again.’ Of course, they all cleared out at once, the master-at-arms and his corporals assisting them over the side; but when they were all comfortably landed on board the tug, she steamed off right away for the harbour, with a long string of wherries and shore boats pulling like blue niggers after her, the men in them swearing like anything at being cheated of their fares. We all the while were getting up anchor and in another minute or two were under weigh. Captain Gordon, who was the admiral’s flag captain, spoke to him about the poor watermen and bumboat women being robbed of their money by our starting so suddenly; but he could get no satisfaction from old Charley. ‘Bumboat women be hanged!’ was all he said. ‘Let ’em take their payment out of the fore tops’l, and the main topgallant s’l shall be witness to the bargain!’ With that, he orders the men, who were muttering to be piped down.”

“But the cow, sir,” said I, on the paymaster’s assistant thus coming to a conclusion, without alluding to what I considered the principal point of his story. “You haven’t told us yet about that, sir.”

“Oh, yes, I forgot,” said he. “It was a fine beast, I remember, one of the red Alderney breed. Well, this cow was first stowed away in a pen the admiral had rigged up for her on the starboard side of the main deck, forrud; but on the gunner objecting to the mess the animal made there, she was then shifted to the port side, in the middle of the mess deck of the foretopmen. Here, too, she was found such a nuisance that the hands in a very short time determined to get rid of her as quickly as they could, either by fair means or foul; and, of course, they managed this right enough. Let sailors alone for that!”

“But, how did they manage it, sir?” asked Tommy Mills, who appeared to take as much interest in the narrative as myself. “Did they kill her, or chuck her overboard?”

“They did neither directly; but, indirectly, I may say they did both,” answered Mr Jones, enigmatically, smiling and pulling his long whiskers caressingly through his fingers, as if particularly proud of these hirsute adornments. “The fact was, the unprincipled scoundrels gave her alternately buckets full of dry biscuit-dust and water which so inflated the poor beast that she became the size of a balloon in less than a week; and, if she had not through this been suffocated, she would of course have burst from the ‘abnormal expansion!’ That is how our doctor, old Nettleby, the same we’ve got on board here now, described it to the admiral when he was sent to inspect the cow, when the butcher reported her dead.”

“What did the admiral say, sir, when he heard this?”

“Oh, he stormed and let fly a volley of picturesque language,” replied Mr Jones to this inquiry of mine; “but what could he do? ‘Throw her out of the bow port,’ he said to the gunner, who pitched a yarn about it being the foretopmen who had done the fell deed. ‘I don’t know whether its your foretopmen or maintop-men that are to be blamed for it, and I don’t care; but, you’ve stopped my milk between you, and I’m hanged if I don’t stop your grog!’”

“And did he, sir?” asked little Tom Mills. “Did he stop their grog for it?”

“No,” replied Mr Jones. “He was too good-natured an old chap for that.”

“More than you were half-an-hour ago,” observed Mr Stormcock, sarcastically, rising up from his recumbent position. “You didn’t think of the fellows coming down from their watch on deck, when you drained off the last remains of the milk, eh? Yes, my joker, you left this cheeky youngster here to go without any in his tea, making him think of home and his mammy! yes, all through your selfishness.”

“Now, really, Stormcock,” expostulated the paymaster, “upon my word I didn’t think of that, or I wouldn’t have been so greedy. Really, now, upon my honour!”

Just then, the boatswain’s call was heard ringing through the ship, and the drummers began beating to quarters, which made us all jump up.

“By jingo, I wonder what’s in the wind now!” exclaimed Mr Stormcock, making a grab at his sword-belt, which he had unfastened for comfort after his breakfast, laying it alongside him on the locker while taking his snooze. “It’s always ‘All hands,’ or ‘Quarters,’ or the ‘Fire Bell,’ or something! I was just thinking of going into my cabin and having a fair lay off the land till noon, for there’s nothing for me to do on deck; when here comes this hanged rattle of the drum, confound it, to upset my caulk. A fellow can’t call his soul his own aboard ship—a sailor’s life’s a dog’s life, by jingo!”

Chapter Thirteen.

The Chaplain makes a Mistake, and we make Sail.

“Ah! my little friend, here you are, I see, in your proper place,” said Commander Nesbitt kindly to me, on my ranging myself by his side on the poop, where he was standing with the captain; for, being his special messenger, or aide-de-camp, so to speak, although it was not really my watch on deck again till late in the afternoon, I thought on hearing the drummer beat to quarters that I ought to go to him at once. “Every man to his station is the rule on board ship. That is only how order and discipline can be carried out with such a large company to deal with!”

I could see, too, that this rule was observed to the very letter, for the first lieutenant was already on the forecastle, eyeglass in eye, of course, as usual; while Mr Bitpin was on the quarter-deck, just below the break of the poop; and “Joe” Jellaby on the main deck, close to the hatchway, so as to be within easy hail.

Mr Cheffinch, the gunnery lieutenant, and Charley Gilham, in their turn, were on the lower deck, looking after things there, with all the mates and midshipmen and cadets, each at his allotted post and everyone equipped with sword or dirk buckled on ready for instant action.

Mr Triggs, the gunner, likewise had taken the keys of the magazine from their proper resting-place when not wanted for use, just without the door of the captain’s cabin, where a sentry always stood guard over them; and was now prepared with all his staff of “powder-monkeys” to send up whatever ammunition might be required at a moment’s notice.

The carpenter, too, stood by the pumps, and Dr Nettleby, with Mr Macgilpin and Mr Leech, the two assistant-surgeons, had all the contents of their surgical cases—most murderous-looking instruments they were, too—spread out on the wardroom and gunroom tables, as well as plenty of lint and bandages for dressing; while Corporal Macan, with a working party of marines, were told off to act as stretcher bearers, and supply hospital aid to the imaginary wounded.

The remainder of the “jollies” were drawn up in martial array on the after part of the poop, under the command of Captain Targetts and Lieutenants Wagstaff and Shunter of the same serviceable corps; all of the men spick and span in their full regimentals and appearing as smart as if on the parade ground at Forton; although, but a few minutes previously, most of the poor fellows had been washing plates and mess traps, and performing other menial duties below.

Young as I was, I could not help observing all this, and noting, as the commander had pointed out to me, how, thanks to a rigid discipline and the inexorable regularity, almost like that of a machine, with which the routine of duty is conducted on board a man-of-war, every officer and man, from the captain down to the smallest “powder-monkey,” was in his proper place and at his station before the rat-tat-tat of the drum had ceased reverberating fore and aft; albeit, most of the hands had only recently joined the ship, while some, indeed, had never before been to sea.

Of course, there was a good deal of scurrying to and fro and apparent confusion whilst the men were getting to their stations, the hasty trampling of feet along the decks and the scrambling up of hatchways, some snatching their rifles from the arm racks and belting on their cutlasses as they hurried by, slinging their cartridge pouches over their shoulders at the run; and, meanwhile, Commander Nesbitt, with my insignificant self by his side, remained at the end of the poop-rail, taking in everything that went on with his quick-glancing, watchful eye, waiting quietly till all the preparations were complete.

“Bosun’s mate!” he sang out when all were ready. “Pipe the hands to secure the guns for sea!”

This was a sad come down from all the grand things which some new to the game expected; but, as we all learnt within a very short time of our novitiate, life at sea is a series of surprises, and, if the ruling maxim be “To hear is to obey,” carried out with Draconian severity to the extreme letter of the law, the beauty of it lies in the fact that you never know what you are going to hear until you actually hear it.

The captain, is, it must be remembered, a sort of Delphic oracle of the marine genus, who invariably keeps his mystic intentions locked within the secret recesses of his own breast and only gives them utterance, when the occasion arrives for him to speak, through the lips of his chief augur, the commander.

None of “the profane vulgar,” in the shape of the ship’s company, know what will be the next move on the board until he gives the inspired word; although, if unguessed until finally uttered, it is generally short, sharp and to the point!

That word being now given, needless to add, it was immediately acted upon.

The breechings of the guns on each deck were bowsed up and the side tackle falls hove taut and frapped, with preventer tackles rigged and secured round the brackets at the after part of the carriages and hooked to the ring-bolts in the ship’s side; all the guns’ crews assisting in this task, and the marines and idlers tailing on to the falls and hauling away at the sound of the boatswain’s pipe and only stopping pulling at the order being given “Avast heaving!”

When passing round with the commander presently to see if all the guns had been properly made fast, so that there should be no chance of their “taking charge” in a heavy seaway and running themselves out without leave or licence when we least expected it, I overheard “Joe” Jellaby talking to Charley Gilham, who had now come up from the lower deck and was standing by the main hatchway.

“I say, Charley,” observed Mr Jellaby, “have you seen our ‘sky pilot’ yet?”

“No, ‘Joe,’” replied the other. “He didn’t come into the wardroom till after dinner, and I had to go on deck for the first watch, and so didn’t see him.”

“Well, he’s the greenest chaplain I ever saw on board ship before,” went on “Joe,” with a chuckle of merriment. “He’s been dodging in and out of his cabin since One Bell sounded, with all his pulpit rig on, as if he didn’t know what exactly to do with himself and was afraid to ask anyone.”

“Perhaps he thought the bell rang for church,” suggested Mr Gilham. “One of the fellows told me the parson has never been to sea before; so, my boy, of course, he doesn’t know he’s got to wait till the cap’en gives the order for service to be held. Those shore Johnnies have got a lot to be knocked into them! He doesn’t know Farmer as we do, or he’d fight shy of taking a liberty with him!”

“Fancy, though, his skylarking round, in all his war paint,” said “Joe,” breaking into his jovial laugh, which always made me join in for sympathy. “I shouldn’t wonder if he belonged to what they call the church militant; and on hearing the drummer beat to quarters, he naturally thought he ought to be prepared with his spiritual weapons as we were buckling on our arms, eh? By Jove, there he is now coming out of the wardroom right up to us! I say, Charley, stand by me, like a good chap.”

But, Mr Gilham, thought in this instance that “discretion was the better part of valour,” for he gave poor “Joe” the slip by incontinently bolting up the hatchway, leaving his comrade to encounter alone the chaplain, who the next moment, in full canonicals, surplice and hood and cassock and all, confronted him.

He was a slim, sandy-coloured gentleman, I noticed, with hair of the tint of tow. He had also white eyelashes, and spoke in a thin, hesitating voice, with a timid manner, as if very nervous and uncertain of his footing.

“A–hem,” he began, with a slight affected cough of introduction. “I be—believe I’m addressing Mr —?”

“Jellaby is my name, sir,” said the lieutenant, filling up the hiatus in his speech and bowing politely. “Joe Jellaby, at your service. Is there anything I can do for you, Mr —?”

“Smythe, sir, is my name,” replied the other. “I am the ah—chaplain.”

“So I see, sir,” said Joe, drily, glancing at his canonicals. “Glad to have the pleasure of making your acquaintance, Mr Smith.”

“‘Smythe,’ that is ‘Smith’ with a final ‘e,’ if you please,” corrected the reverend gentleman in a plaintive tone. “My name is not ‘Smith,’ Mr Jellyboy.”

“Nor is mine Jellyboy, Mr Smythe,” retorted “Joe,” laughing outright at the comical situation. “We’ve both made a mistake, Mr Smythe; and I apologise for mine. But, is there anything I can do for you, sir?”

“Well,” hesitated the other, “I want, you know, to hold a service, you know—ah, and—”

“You’ll have to ask the captain after divisions, sir,” put in “Joe” anxious to close the interview, for the drums had begun to beat the Retreat for the men to return their arms. “Excuse me, though, please, Mr Smythe, I’ve got to go on deck now.”

With that he vanished up the hatchway after Mr Gilham; and, thereupon the unhappy Mr Smythe found himself, with his “final e,” in the midst of a seething mass of men racing along the deck to put their rifles and cutlasses back in the racks, being finally compelled to beat a retreat himself to the wardroom, while the boatswain and his mates were piping and shouting all over the ship for the hands to clean themselves and dress for “Divisions.”

A quarter-of-an-hour later, both watches were mustered, all decently dressed, like “Sally in our Alley,” in their Sunday best, according to their respective stations; the first and second divisions on the upper deck and forecastle, under the first lieutenant and Mr Jellaby; the third and fourth divisions on the main deck, with Mr Gilham and Mr Bitpin at the head of the men; and the fifth and sixth on the lower deck, in charge of “Gunnery Jack,” in lieu of one of the regular lieutenants, and the second mate, the fat Plumper, bursting out of his buttons as usual, who was at the head of the after-guard, among whom I recognised the ex-gravedigger, “Downy.”

This worthy, I noticed, looked quite smart and seaman-like in the dungaree suit he had purchased from Mrs Poll Nash, the bumboat woman, which his messmates had taught him to rig up in proper man-o’-war fashion, the good-hearted chaps also supplying whatever other necessaries were required for his wardrobe, such as the black silk handkerchief, tied in a loose knot round his neck, and the knife and lanyard without which no bluejacket’s toilet is complete.

The men were drawn up in line, two deep, in open order, ready for inspection, and the captain and commander were just about descending from the poop to go round the ranks; when, up came the Reverend Mr Smythe on the quarter-deck in his complete clerical regalia, only now with his college cap on, which, when I had seen him before by the main hatchway, he had carried in his hand.

He now raised this in salute to the captain and then immediately replaced it, seeing that none of us were uncovered, all of us having our caps on of course, being in uniform.

Captain Farmer only gave the regulation touch to the peak of his in return for the chaplain’s courtesy.

“Well, sir,” said Captain Farmer in his direct way, as Mr Smythe struggled to speak, feeling that the eyes of all hands were upon him, blushing a rosy red up to the roots of his sandy hair, “what is it?”

“Am I—ah—to begin now, sir,” he stammered; “or, wa—wa—wait till the bell rings again, sir?”

“Bell rings!” repeated the captain, abruptly. “For what, sir?”

“For service, sir.”

“Service?” said Captain Farmer, in a questioning tone still. “I’ve given no orders about any service to-day. There’s no time for it now. We’re going to weigh anchor in another minute or two.”

“Weigh the anchor, sir!” exclaimed Mr Smythe, in a voice of holy indignation, losing all his hesitancy and awkwardness of speech. “Why, it is Sunday!”

“The better the day, the better the deed,” rejoined the captain, rather sternly, I thought. “If you overhaul your Bible you’ll find it was only the Pharisees who objected to any necessary work being done on the Sabbath, and I myself see nothing wrong in our sailing on this day if we have a fair wind, Sunday though it be; besides which, I am obeying the orders of my queen and country.”

“But, sir,” cried Mr Smythe, flushing up again, though now more from the heat of argument than from the feeling of bashfulness which at first oppressed him, “it is my duty to celebrate divine service, and my bishop—”

“Mr Smythe, I’m bishop here; and, as commanding officer, my word is law,” interrupted Captain Farmer. “The next time you may desire to hold service on board this ship, please be good enough to ask my permission first; for, remember, my rule is paramount here over matters spiritual as well as things temporal. No doubt you have erred through ignorance in trying to set your authority against mine, and I’ll not dwell further on the matter. I am sorry there’ll be no time to-day for you to hold any regular service, for I am now going to inspect the men at divisions; but, after that, you may have a short prayer, if you like, before we make sail.”

The Reverend Mr Smythe, I was glad to notice, took this rebuke in dignified silence, standing aside on the quarter-deck while the captain and commander descended the poop-ladder and went their rounds.

He waited until they had passed forwards before he went down the after-hatchway to the main deck; where, on the completion of the inspection, all hands were mustered and he read the form of prayer enjoined by the rubric for those about to travel by sea, which was listened to more attentively perhaps than it is in any church ashore.

Sailors, however, watch as well as pray; so, no sooner had the chaplain finished than his congregation dispersed instantly to their stations, the commander singing out from the poop, the moment he had reached that coign of vantage, the long-delayed but welcome order, for which we had all been waiting in expectancy since the morning.

“Hands, up anchor!” he cried in a brave shout, to which the boatswain on the forecastle gave a shrill response with his whistle, while his mates re-echoed the cry between decks, up and down the ship fore and aft, “All hands, up anchor!”

The capstan was again manned below, and the marines and idlers heaved in the cable to the sound of the drum and fife, as before; although, this time, the tune was “The Girl I Left Behind Me,” the tramp of their feet coming in every now and again as a sort of chorus to the music, while on the forecastle above, the boatswain overhauled the catfalls, and got up the up and down tackle, and the gunner’s crew rigged out the fish davit with its gear.

“The cable’s ‘up and down,’ sir,” presently reported the boatswain to “glass-eye,” our first lieutenant, who passed the word aft in the usual manner to the commander on the poop. “Cable’s up and down, sir!”

The merry sound of the drum and fife, and steady tramp of the men round the capstan on the main deck continued until, anon, the boatswain once again reported to the Honourable Digby Lanyard, as he stood surveying the progress made in heaving in from the knight heads, “Anchor’s weighed, sir.”

This implied that the heavy mass of metal, of some four tons weight, by which we had been moored, was now off the ground, a fact that increased the strain on the cable and messenger, taking a longer and a stronger pull out of those working the capstan, and making the nippers, too, pass a trifle less briskly than before.

“Anchor’s in sight, sir, and a clear anchor, too!” was the next cry from the forecastle that went from hand to hand aft, causing ‘The Girl I Left Behind Me’ to come out stronger than previously and the tramping feet to hasten their measured tread; and, in another minute or so, the ring of the anchor was chock up to the hawse pipe at the bows, and the boatswain piped “Belay!”

“Hands make sail!” next came from the commander aft, the midshipmen stationed in the tops jumping into the rigging and scrambling up the ratlines before he could shout “Way aloft!”

In an instant, up started the topmen in pursuit, as it seemed, of the middies in a sort of ‘follow my leader’ chase; and ere the vibration of the commander’s voice had ceased to tremble in the air, the active fellows were spread out along the footropes of the yards, loosing the lanyards of the gaskets and casting them off, while the deck-men let go the buntlines and clewlines and other running gear.

“All ready for letting fall, sir,” the middy stationed in the foretop was the first to sing out. This was Dick Popplethorne, a smart lad, who prompted the topmen under his charge to emulate his ready example, so as to get ahead of the others. Larkyns at the maintop was a good second, while Adams at the mizzen was the last; the officer of the watch, on hearing his hail, reporting “All ready!”

“Let fall and sheet home!” thereupon shouted out Commander Nesbitt, with the captain standing behind, as it were, to “back him up,” following this order with another warning hail—“Topsail halliards!”

Our topsails and courses were at once spread; and, then, the men on deck stood by the halliards, hoisting the yards up as soon as the word of command reached them from the commander with his next breath “Hoist away!”

The wind was blowing steadily from the northward and westward as the yards were braced up, and the Candahar payed off handsomely on the port tack with the tide, making for the Warner Lightship to the eastwards; and, as we trimmed sails and bore away from our whilom anchorage in the roadstead, the breeze brought out to us the silvery chimes of the bells of old Saint Thomas’, ringing the good people to church while we stood out to sea.

There was a clear blue sky overhead and the bright sun mellowed the frosty feel of the air, lighting up the blue water around us, as we ploughed our way through the dancing wavelets; our noble ship curvetting and prancing along, similar to some gallant charger tossing its head and showing off its paces, throwing up the spray over her forecastle when she dipped deeper than usual and leaving a long wake behind her, like a lady’s fan, all sprinkled over with pearls, stretching back to Spithead, now far away astern.

Chapter Fourteen.

Down Channel.

Meanwhile, the first lieutenant and boatswain were busy forward with the forecastle hands, seeing to the catting and fishing of the anchor; and, as soon as our port bower was properly secured by the aid of the cathead stopper and shank painter, the courses, which were all ready to let fall, were dropped and sheeted home, topgallants and royals spread, and the jib and foretopmast staysail set, as well as the spanker aft, the old Candahar being presently under a cloud of canvas alow and aloft, and slowly but surely making an offing and reaching out to sea.

We continued on the same tack until we had weathered the Nab Lightship, some ten miles out, when, being favoured with a “sojer’s wind,” fair both ways, we trimmed sails again and braced the yards up, wearing ship and gradually altering course from a nearly due east direction to one “west-half-south,” fetching a compass down Channel.

We passed on our starboard hand within easy cannon shot of the Isle of Wight, whose bold, projecting headlands and curving bays of white and yellow sand we opened in turn every minute, with their purple hills beyond and deep-shadowed valleys lit up ever and anon by a gleam of sunshine as we sailed gaily on; the blue sky above our heads seeming in the clear atmosphere to recede further and further back into the immensity of space as we proceeded while the blue water around us became bluer and, more intense in tone, except where here and there the crest of a breaking wave flecked it with foam.

At Seven Bells, when the watch was set, we had given the snub-nosed Dunose the go-by and were heading for Saint Catherine’s Point, going about eight knots under all plain sail, the wind freshening as we drew away from under the lee of the land, and the ship getting livelier.

Just as I was looking over the side and noting this fact, while watching the gull’s circling in our wake, uttering their plaintive screams at intervals that sounded like the ghost cries of drowned sailors buried beneath the sea, Mr Quadrant, the master, who was on the poop, sextant in hand, reported it was twelve o’clock; whereupon, the commander telling him to “make it so,” Eight Bells was struck, the men being piped to dinner immediately afterwards in obedience to another order from headquarters aft.

Not being wanted any longer on deck, and the crisp, bracing sea air giving me a good appetite, I hurried down the hatchway to join my messmates in the gunroom, mindful by my morning’s experiences of the disadvantage of being late for meals.

Quick as I was, I found the majority of the other fellows not on duty had already forestalled me, chief among these early birds being my chum, Tom Mills.

This young gentleman, all in his glory, was lording it over poor Dobb’s, the long-suffering steward, at a fine rate, I noticed, making Mr Stormcock waxy with his remarks about the fare.

This, really, was not at all bad in quality nor scanty in quantity, as the irate master’s mate asseverated with considerable heat.

It was much better, indeed, than most of us youngsters had probably been accustomed to when at school in our longshore days, no matter how we might growl and turn up our noses at it now; but, cocksy Master Tommy, of course, was incorrigible, treating such an innuendo as this, in spite of the loud voice and pointed manner of Mr Stormcock, with the contempt it deserved, the young rascal grinning and sticking his tongue in his cheek in so provocative a fashion that the master’s mate instantly pitched a hot potato at him.

This caught Mr Fortescue Jones, the unoffending assistant-paymaster, in the eye, and made all the purser’s clerks yell with laughter.

When I went on deck again, shortly after Three Bells, we were pretty well clear of the Isle of Wight, the Needles Rocks being off our weather quarter and some miles distant, with the Dorset coast looming ahead.

As I stood listening to the quartermaster instructing the helmsmen, one of whom was a young hand, telling them to keep the ship a couple of points free, until, as time went on, it came close to the next hour, two o’clock, or Four Bells; when, according to the routine of the service, Adams, who was midshipman of the watch, hove the log and reported that we were still only going eight knots, with the ebb tide in our favour.

At that moment, Captain Farmer came out of his cabin; and, hearing this, directed the officer of the watch, Mr Bitpin, whose rightful turn of duty it was, to set studding sails, not being satisfied, apparently, with the old Candahar’s progress, although she was doing her best and surging along in grand style, as I thought.

“Bosun’s mate!” thereupon sang out the lieutenant. “Pipe watch to set starboard topmast and to’gallant stu’ns’ls!”

“Ay, ay, sir,” replied the boatswain’s mate from his post by the after-hatchway; and, almost in the same breath, his piercing shrill whistle was heard, followed by his hoarse shout repeating Mr Bitpin’s gruff command. “Watch set starboard topmast and to’gallant stu’ns’ls!”

“Topmen aloft!”

“Jiggers at the tops’l lifts!”

“Clear away stu’ns’l gear!”

These successive orders were now jerked out in rapid rotation by Mr Bitpin, who stood at the poop-rail bellowing away like a wild bull, Captain Farmer remaining alongside him and surveying with critical eye all that was done as the hands scrambled up the rigging and bustled about the deck, casting off ropes and getting the booms prepared; until, anon, the captains of the fore and maintops and the captain of the forecastle, as well as the gunner’s mate, whose task it was to see to the main topmast studding sail, reported “All ready!”

Therefore the lieutenant, with a deeper bellow than before, shouted “Sway away!”

In an instant, the watch on deck, bending on to the halliards with a will, hoisted the gleaming white sails aloft and sheeted them home; when, bellying out before the northerly breeze, they expanded their folds, making the yardarms creak again, and looking like the wings of some gigantic seabird, the ship herself bearing out the resemblance and swooping away in a heavy lurch to leeward, after apparently preening her pinions for a fresh flight, being now a perfect pyramid of canvas from truck to deck.

“Mr Adams,” called out Mr Bitpin presently from the poop, evidently in obedience to some quiet order given by the captain, to the midshipman, who of course stood immediately below his superior officer on the quarter-deck, “heave the log again and tell me what she’s going now!”

“Very good, sir,” replied Frank Adams; and, after the necessary interval of heaving the log-ship over the side to leeward and counting the knots on the line while the fourteen-second glass held by the quartermaster was running out, he sang out “She’s going nearly ten, sir.”

“Ah!” muttered Captain Farmer, who had come down the poop-ladder and was waiting for the news before returning to his cabin, as he passed the marine sentry before disappearing within the sliding door, expressing his thoughts aloud, “That’s better, much better—I thought she could do it with this wind!” It was a beautiful afternoon; and, from its being Sunday, several of the wardroom officers came on deck after luncheon, having nothing especial to do below.

Amongst the lot were Dr Nettleby and Mr Nipper, the paymaster.

I also observed on the poop the Reverend Mr Smythe and “Joe” Jellaby, who had contrived to secure sufficient snoozing, during the odd moments when he was off duty since the morning, to make up for the sleep he had lost by going to the admiral’s ball and there meeting the witching houri of his dreams, “that chawming gurl,” who had subsequently prevented him from taking his proper rest when he came aboard in the small hours of the middle watch.

The chaplain seemed to have taken a fancy to “Joe,” for he stuck on to him as soon as he came up the hatchway; joining with some considerable difficulty in the lieutenant’s constitutional “quarter-deck walk.” The reverend gentleman had not got his sea legs yet, and did not find it an easy matter to keep step, or indeed keep his footing sometimes.

This was more especially the case when the ship heeled over every now and again before the force of the wind and then righted herself on an even keel without warning, throwing Mr Smythe off his balance and causing him to clutch frantically at Joe’s arm for support till he recovered his lost centre of gravity.

The lieutenant’s courtesy was put to a severe test in making him preserve his gravity; albeit, he had an itching inclination to burst out into his jovial laugh at the reverend gentleman’s ridiculous contortions and praiseworthy attempts to sustain a sort of disjointed conversation between the pauses of his grotesque sprawls and restoration to a more dignified attitude.

As they were marching up and down the deck in this desultory way, describing the while a series of irregular ellipses, Six Bells was struck forwards, and the marine stationed by the taffrail at once shouted out in a high key, “Life-buoy!”

“Dear me!” exclaimed Mr Smythe in a shrill tone of alarm, which his squeaky voice was well calculated to express, bringing up suddenly against one of the quarter boats which was swung inboard from the davits; and knocking his head violently against the bottom planking, through the ship lurching as he stopped. “What has happened—is anyone lost overboard?”

“Oh, no,” replied “Joe,” laughing as usual. “It’s only the jolly in charge of the life-buoy. He has to sing out every time the bell is struck to show that he’s at his post, just as the sojers ashore on sentry-go cry ‘All’s well!’ to tell their sergeant they’re not napping, that’s all.”

“Ah!” ejaculated the chaplain with a feeble smile, putting his hand to his head as if in great pain from the blow he had received, “I see—ah, I see.”

“I hope you haven’t hurt yourself,” said “Joe,” seeing that the other kept his white cambric handkerchief still tightly pressed to his forehead. “That was a rather nasty knock you got! Cut yourself, eh?”

“I—I—don’t quite know, you know,” answered the reverend gentleman, removing the handkerchief after some hesitation and proceeding to examine it carefully as if fearing the worst; but, finding now no trace of blood on its snowy surface, he became reassured and said, in a more cheery tone, “no, not cut, I think, only a severe contusion, thank you, Mr Jellaby. The pain has nearly gone now!”

“That’s right; I’m glad you’ve escaped so well,” said “Joe,” taking Mr Smythe’s arm again and wheeling him in line so as to resume their walk; while I stood by, with my ears cocked, listening to the detached fragments of their talk. “On board my last ship, the Blanche, we had a rum start one day with our life-buoy sentry. Would you like me to tell you the story?”

“Thanks, much,” responded the chaplain; “I should be delighted.”

“Well, you see,” began the lieutenant, starting off with his yarn and quarter-deck walk again simultaneously, “we had a lot of raw marine lads who had just enlisted sent us from Forton to complete our complement; and, one of these green hands, as luck would have it, was placed as sentry on the poop by the sergeant of the guard, the first day he came aboard, though he’d probably never seen a ship in his life before. You see, eh?”

“Ah!” ejaculated the chaplain as “Joe” turned abruptly when close up to the taffrail and nearly twisted him off his legs. “Yes, I—ah—see.”

“When the poor jolly was put on sentry,” continued the lieutenant, bolstering up Mr Smythe with his arm and just saving him in the nick of time from coming to grief again over a ringbolt on the deck, “the sergeant told him he would have to call out when the bell was struck, thinking, of course, he knew all about it. The poor fellow, though, as you are aware, was quite ignorant of the custom; so, as soon as the sergeant’s back was turned, he asked one of the men of the starboard watch standing by, ‘What am I to call out when they strike the bell?’

“‘Life-buoy!’ replied the other. ‘Life-buoy!’

“‘All right, chummy, I thank you kindly,’ said the young marine, full of gratitude; and so, when, by-and-by, Two Bells were struck, he called out in a voice that could be heard all over the ship, ‘Live boy!’”

“He—he—he!” chuckled the chaplain in his feeble way, he and Mr Jellaby coming to a stop, I was glad to see, close to where I stood. “That was funny! Very, very funny!”

“Nothing to what’s coming,” went on Mr Jellaby, pleased that his efforts at comic narrative under such difficulties had been so far successful, the chaplain not objecting to the secular amusement from any conscientious scruples. “Well, as soon as the ignorant chaw-bacon chap yelled out this, which naturally made everyone who heard it laugh, although they put the mistake down to the poor fellow’s provincial pronunciation, he turns to the man who had previously instructed him and asks in a proud sort of way, as if seeking praise for his performance, ‘Say, how did I sing out that, chum?’

“‘Very well,’ replied the other, who, if he had advised him in good faith in the first instance, on now seeing the result of his teaching was anxious to take a rise out of the ‘stupid jolly,’ as he thought him. ‘But, chummy, you’ll have to do different next time.’

“‘Oh!’ exclaimed the marine. ‘What shall I have to sing out, then?’

“‘You called “Live boy” at Two Bells; and so it’ll be “Dead boy” when it strikes Three Bells. It’s always turn and turn about aboard ship.’

“‘Yes, that’s fair enough and I thank you kindly,’ answered the poor marine, sucking in the other’s gammon like milk, not perceiving for a moment that the sailor was ‘pulling his leg’; and, the next time the bell sounded, as sure as we both stand here, if you’ll believe me, Mr Smythe, the silly donkey shouted out, even louder than he had done before, at the very pitch of his voice, ‘Dead boy.’”

“He, he, he!” cackled Mr Smythe again, while Dick Popplethorne, who had joined me by the taffrail and was intently listening like myself to “Joe’s” yarn, burst out in a regular guffaw, which he had to choke his fist into his mouth to suppress; for, any such violent expression of merriment was totally at variance with the discipline of a man-of-war and had to be checked at once for the good of the service! “But, what—ah, happened, Mr Jellaby, to the poor fellow, eh?”

“Why, the officer of the watch sent for the sergeant of the guard with a file of marines, and put the man under arrest for being drunk and mutinous!”

“You don’t—ah, mean to say he was punished?”

“No,” replied “Joe,” with a wink to us. “He certainly was brought up on the quarter-deck before the captain, who had heard his queer shout, as everybody did, indeed, who was on deck at the time; but, the bluejacket who had misled him came forward at the last moment and got him released from chokey, our captain, who was a good-tempered chap and enjoyed a joke, letting them both off, although he read ’em a lecture and had to bite his lip the while he spoke of the heinousness of their joint offence, he being hardly able to speak seriously!”

“Ah, I see,” said the Reverend Mr Smythe approvingly, though in a very faint tone, walking off towards the poop-ladder with the lieutenant’s aid, having evidently had enough of the ship’s rolling. He expressed a wish to seek the seclusion of his own cabin, whereat I was not surprised, both Dick Popplethorne and myself having observed his face assume a greenish-yellowy-liver sort of look during the last few moments of “Joe’s” narrative; but he kept up his courage to the last, murmuring yet more faintly as he tottered below. “Ve-wy good—ah! Ye-es, ve-wy good—ah, indeed!”

“Funny, wasn’t it?” said Dick Popplethorne to me as the two turned away, laughing again, only more quietly now. “What a rum start for him to sing out, ‘dead boy!’”

I thought so, too—afterwards.

Chapter Fifteen.

Off Ushant.

At Eight Bells, or four o’clock in the ordinary parlance of landsmen, Mr Bitpin was relieved by the first lieutenant, who then came on deck with the rest of the starboard watch to take charge, while the port watch went below at the same time.

This hour marked the beginning of the first dog watch, which, it may be here mentioned for the benefit of the uninitiated, only lasts two hours, from four o’clock to six, when the second dog watch, of similar duration, commences and continues until eight o’clock, or “Eight Bells,” again.

These subdivisions of time are necessary on board ship in order to allow all to share alike the rough with the smooth, and give the officers and men a change at regular intervals from day to night service, and the reverse; for, if all the watches were of equal length, there could not be any possible variation of the hours during which the hands would be on and off duty respectively, the one section of the crew in such case coming on deck at precisely the same time each day and going below in similar rotation.

By the system in vogue, however, of cutting one of the watches into two parts, which is common to the seamen of all countries in the mercantile marine and is not merely limited to the routine of our men-of-war, there is a constant change introduced; so that, the men who take, say, the first watch to-night, from eight o’clock till midnight, will have the middle watch to-morrow night, and so on in regular sequence until the time comes round again for them to “return to their old love” again!

“Glass-eye,” as the men called the first lieutenant, I noticed, was a much smarter hand than Mr Bitpin, in spite of his drawly way of speaking and lackadaisical airs below; and when he was officer of the watch there was no lolling about the deck or any of the talking that went on behind the boats and in odd corners, as was the case while “old growler” had charge.

Everyone then, on the contrary, brightened up and kept to his station; while even the old quartermaster and helmsman drawing themselves up at “attention” as soon as the Honourable Digby Lanyard’s long, telescopic form appeared on the poop, just as if he were the commander, or Captain Farmer himself.

The Honourable was not long inactive, for the sun was already beginning to sink below the western horizon, lighting up Saint Alban’s Head, abreast of which we were now speeding along, with a bright glare that displayed every detail of its steep escarpment and the rocky foreshore at its base; the glorious orb of day presently disappearing beneath the ocean, leaving a track of radiance behind him across the watery waste and flooding the heavens overhead with a harmony of vivid colouring in which every tint of the rainbow was represented—crimson and purple and gold, melting into rose, that paled again into the most delicate sea—green and finally became merged in the more neutral tones of night!

“Looks like a change coming, I think,” observed Mr Quadrant, the master, glancing at the sunset more with the eye of a meteorologist than that of an artist. “Those northerly winds never last long in the Channel, especially at this time of year.”

“The evening’s closing in, too,” said the “first luff,” screwing his eyeglass more tightly into the corner of his eye and bending his lanky body over the poop-rail to see if everything was all right on the deck below, after taking a hurried squint aloft. “I shall shorten sail at once. Bosun’s mate!”

You should have heard him roar out this hail. Why, it made me jump off my feet as if a cannon had been fired, with a full charge, close to my head!

“Ay, ay, sir,” replied the boatswain’s mate, coming under the break of the poop, so as to be nearer at hand; but there was certainly no necessity for his approaching in order to hear better, for the lieutenant’s voice would have been audible a mile off, “I’m here, sir.”

“Pipe the watch to shorten sail!”

“Ay, ay, sir.”

There was no need, though, of pipe or shout from the worthy petty officer addressed, notwithstanding that the lusty seaman could have piped and shouted with the best, should duty demand it of him; for, the lieutenant’s order had already reached the ears of every man of the watch, and all were at their several stations, ready for the next command.

This was not long-delayed.

“Topmen aloft! In royals and to’gallant stu’ns’ls!” he bellowed, in a tone that put that of poor Mr Bitpin completely into the shade; his voice sounding as if the wild bull which that gentleman had apparently imitated, according to the facetious Larkyns, had since been under the instruction of Signor Lablache or some other distinguished bass singer and had learnt to mellow his roar into a deeper tone. No sooner, too, had the hands jumped into the rigging and the studdingsail halliards and tacks been cast off by the watch on deck and the downhauls and sheets manned, than the “first luff,” pitching his voice to yet a higher key, sang out in rapid sequence, “Topmast stu’ns’l downhaul—haul taut—clew up—all down!”

“Bosun’s mate,” he then cried, “turn the hands up!”

This was the last order he gave on his own responsibility; for, while the men of the watch below were hurrying up on deck in obedience to the busy boatswain’s mates’ whistle and shout of “all ha-a-nds,” which could still be heard ringing through the ship, Commander Nesbitt came up on the poop and took charge.

He thus superseded his subordinate, the lieutenant; it being the custom of the service for the commander to “carry on” on such occasions and the officer of the watch, whoever he might be, to “play second fiddle,” as the saying goes, which part the “first luff,” took in the present instance, proceeding at once to his proper station on the forecastle.

No cessation occurred, however, in the task of shortening sail.

“Hands reef tops’ls!” shouted the commander almost on the instant he gained the poop, following this up by the command, “Topmen aloft—take in one reef—way aloft!”

Of course Adams and Larkyns and Popplethorne had to scramble up to their posts in the mizzen and main and foretops, much to my admiration and envy; for, being only a cadet, I was not allowed to go aloft except for drill, and then only under special supervision, as I will presently tell.

While these lucky beggars, as I then thought them, were footing it up the ratlines, the commander sang out in rapid rotation, the orders necessary to make the way clear for taking in the reef required—

“Weather topsail braces—round in—lower the tops’ls!”

“Trice up and lay out!”

By these being acted on, the wind was first “spilled” out of the three topsails, which were then lowered on the caps; and, the studdingsail booms being triced up to their usual place when not set, in the topmost rigging, the men were able to go out on the yards and commence reefing in earnest.

On the completion of this, the command was given to hoist away; whereupon the halliards were manned below and the topsails run up again.

“Trim sails!” sang out Commander Nesbitt as soon as he saw the middies and their men coming down from aloft. “Lee braces—brace up the yards!”

During all this time, though, the wind had been shifting to the westward and ahead; and, noticing the jib beginning to shiver and flap, the commander came to the fore again.

“Brace the mainyard sharp up!” he shouted; when, on the seamen at the bitts reporting that “the mark” was “down,” or, in other words, that the yard had been braced up as far as it would go, the other yards were trimmed parallel and the active commander cried, “Belay the main brace!”

“By jingo, I think he might say ‘splice the main brace’ now, after all this jollification!” growled Mr Stormcock, who had come up on the quarter-deck while the ship was thus being made snug for the night and left now under easy sail, consisting of the courses with reefed topsails and topgallants, as well as the jib and spanker and foretopmast staysail. “The poor fellows must be precious dry with all that cutting about up and down the ratlines, and I wouldn’t mind a glass of grog myself.”

“No, really, you don’t mean that!” said Larkyns chaffingly. “Wouldn’t you prefer a cup of tea, now?”

“Cup of tea be hanged!” rejoined the master’s mate, angrily. “You youngsters of the present day are always thinking of your tea, like a lot of blessed old women! In my time, fellows at sea didn’t go in for slops and mollycoddling, as all of you do now. By jingo, the gunroom might as well be turned into a nursery at once, with such a pack of children about!”

“At all events, we’d never be at a loss for a nurse, old chappie, with you aboard,” said Larkyns, sniggering. “Indeed, you’d make even a better one than we could get ashore.”

“Hey!” exclaimed Mr Stormcock, a bit puzzled at this. “What do you mean?”

“I don’t mean a dry nurse, you know, old chappie, though you said, you were ‘dry’ just now,” replied Larkyns, laughing at his own joke. “Nor do I mean a wet ’un. No, old chappie, I mean a wetter-un, do you twig?”

“Phaugh!” ejaculated the master’s mate, with a gesture of disgust, as he turned towards the binnacle to take the course the ship was steering, so as to lay it off on his chart and estimate the distance run and our probable position by dead reckoning. “A beastly pun like that is enough a make a fellow sick!”

“All right, old chappie, I’d better get out of your way, if that’s the case,” rejoined Larkyns, chuckling. “I’ll go below and finish my tea, which I would certainly not have left behind me, with you about, had it been grog!”

With which parting shot at what was generally believed to be Mr Stormcock’s particular weakness, and one which had delayed his promotion, Larkyns hopped down the after-hatchway on his way to the gunroom, I following after him, nothing loth to have some little refreshment after my long stay on deck, this having made me hungry again.

Things were pretty quiet below, I found, most of the noisier spirits of the mess having eaten their fill and departed; and, fortunately, the gunroom steward had not forgotten us late-comers, there being plenty of the “water-bewitched” sort of beverage that goes by the name of “tea” on board ship, albeit we had to be content with an extra allowance of sugar in lieu of milk.

To make up for this, however, the good-natured Dobbs had thoughtfully reserved for the delectation of Larkyns and myself a fragment of some very stale cake, which, from the important air he assumed when presenting it to our astonished gaze, he evidently considered a great treat; and, I was really sorry at Larkyns making some unkind remark or other about Noah and the Ark in connection with this venerable dainty that, I’m sure, must have hurt the feelings of the steward, who meant to do us a kindness, no doubt, and, at all events, did his best!

At Four Bells, or six o’clock, I went on deck again with Mr Jellaby and the port watch, remaining on duty until the end of the second dog watch.

By that time, we were passing the Bill of Portland, sailing close-hauled still down Channel on the starboard tack; but, I was so tired out that I could hardly keep my eyes open, only knowing what the quartermaster kindly told me, so on getting below again soon after Eight Bells, I turned into my hammock without troubling much at undressing, and was “as fast as a top” within less than a minute of reaching the steerage.

Next morning, on awakening, I was much surprised at everything being very quiet between decks, without any motion of the ship or rush of the water past her sides, and I wondered what had happened to cause this stillness.

On turning out, however, my wonder was soon allayed by discovering that we had made Plymouth during the small hours, and were now anchored in the Sound, midway between Mount Edgecombe and the breakwater.

I may add, that the mess table in the gunroom at breakfast clearly demonstrated our proximity to this very hospitable port, by the lavish abundance of milk and eggs, not to speak of bloaters and marmalade, so that even Tom Mills was satisfied.

He did not have the heart to take another rise out of the irascible caterer, Mr Stormcock; while, as for Plumper, the senior mate, I never saw a chap eat in my life as he did.

An ostrich of the most enterprising digestion, or the boa-constrictor at the Zoological Gardens who recently swallowed its messmate in a weak moment, would neither of them have been a match for the fat little gourmand, who made even Dobbs stare at his efforts in the knife-and-fork line.

We stopped at Plymouth for some four-and-twenty hours, shipping supernumeraries and taking in surplus stores.

After which, weighing anchor again, we worked out of the Sound, having to tack twice before clearing the breakwater; and, resuming our passage we passed the Lizard the same afternoon, being some ten or twelve miles to the southward of the Bishop’s Rock in the Scilly Isles at midnight.

I noticed the bright, star-like light of the latter, low down on the horizon, away on our weather quarter, only just dimly discernible in the distance through the haze, when I came on deck for the middle watch, the lighthouse looking to me as if twinkling to us a last farewell from home and the land we had left, never, perhaps, to see again.

But, although we made fair enough progress, we were not able to preserve as straight a course as Captain Farmer and the master would have liked to have done.

The wind was continually on the shift and trying to head us, thus causing us to keep the ship away and steer more to the southward; instead of making all the westering we could when leaving the channel, so as to give Cape Ushant, with its erratic currents and treacherous indraught, as wide a berth as possible—the French coast being a bad lookout under one’s lee at any time!

However, we had to make the best we could of the wind we had; and by noon next day, when Mr Quadrant took the sun, having all of us round him on the poop, cadets as well as midshipmen, on the alert to watch for the dip and mark off the angle on our sextants, we were found to be in latitude 48 degrees 50 minutes North, and longitude 7 degrees 35 minutes West, showing that we had run some two hundred miles or so since leaving Plymouth Sound.

After observing the sun’s altitude, we were supposed to work out the reckoning for ourselves independently of each other; though, when the master sent us down to the gunroom to do this, the lazy hands amongst us, who were by a long way in the majority, cribbed from those who were readier at figures, like Larkyns and Ned Anstruther, both of whom arrived at the same result as Mr Quadrant, ay even in a shorter time, handing in their papers for inspection before I had well-nigh begun mine.

“Here, Vernon, take my log and copy it out,” cried Larkyns, seeing me somewhat puzzled over the calculations I was making by the aid of a fat volume of logarithm tables and Roper’s “Navigator”; “you look considerably fogged, old chappie, by the cut of your jib.”

“No thank you,” I replied, all on my mettle, determined not to be beat. “I want to try and make it out by myself, so that I shall know how to do it next time.”

“Bravo, youngster,” put in Mr Stormcock. “That’s the only way to become a good navigator. Fudging your reckoning will never teach you how to work out your altitudes; you stick to it, my boy, and do it on your own hook.”

Nor did the master’s mate content himself with merely giving me this sound advice; for, sitting down by my side, he overhauled my figures and, being an expert mathematician, soon put me in the right road to arriving at a solution of my difficulties.

Really, he explained the various steps necessary in order to work out the reckoning in such a simple way that I understood it thoroughly; learning more in this one lesson from Mr Stormcock than I had done, I think, during the three months that I had studied navigation while on board the training-ship Illustrious.

I learnt even yet more.

That was, not to judge by appearances and form hasty conclusions as to the character of my messmates; as, up to the moment of his coming thus to my aid, I had always considered Mr Stormcock an ill-tempered and soured man—whereas I now saw he was at bottom a good-natured fellow and one ready enough to help another when opportunity offered!

It was a lesson which, like the one he had just taught me in navigation, I never forgot.

Towards sunset that afternoon, when we were entering the Bay of Biscay, the lookout man on the foretopsail yard hailed the deck.

“Sail in sight, sir!” he sang out loudly. “She’s on our port bow, sir.”

“All right,” answered the officer of the watch, Mr Jellaby, who was up on the poop and I below on the quarter-deck at the time; and then, turning to the yeoman of signals, he cried, “Signalman, a vessel’s in sight on our port bow, go and look at her and see what she is.”

“Ay, ay, sir,” replied the seaman, putting his telescope to his eye; when, scanning in the direction pointed out to him, he soon made out the ship. “She appears like a strange man-of-war, sir.”

“Very well,” said Mr Jellaby. “Watch her till you can make her out perfectly.”

In another minute or two, the signalman made the result of his second scrutiny known.

“She’s a French man-of-war and is making for Brest, I think, sir.”

“Ah!” exclaimed “Joe,” having a look at her, too, with his binocular. “Hoist the ensign!”

This was done; but, the stranger made no sign, until, gradually approaching each other all the while, she was about three miles off, when she displayed the gallant tricolour flag of France.

“Signalman,” sang out Mr Jellaby on seeing this, “Dip the colours!”

Our ensign was thereupon raised and lowered from the peak three times in succession, according to the usual nautical etiquette observed on such occasions, the other ship returning the compliment in like fashion; and we were just passing each other, she crossing our bows and sailing away right before the wind on our starboard beam, when, all of a sudden, she brought up, backing her maintopsail and firing a gun at the same time to attract our attention.

“By Jove, she wants to speak us; something must be up!” said the commander who had come on deck in the meanwhile. “Go below, Vernon, and tell the cap’en at once.”

Chapter Sixteen.

“Man Overboard!”

“Confound those mounseers,” I heard Mr Stormcock say to the master as I came out from Captain Farmer’s cabin. “I wonder what they want to stop us for now, just as we were getting clear of Ushant? It’s sure to bring us bad luck!”

“By jingo, it is a nuisance bringing us up like this,” chorused Mr Quadrant, a fellow-grumbler of the same kidney. “We might have carried on as we were standing, if those blessed Parlyvoos, had only let us alone; while now, when we do make a start again, the wind will most probably have headed us, and we’ll then have to go about and bear away to the nor’ard on the port tack, losing all the southing we’ve made since yesterday!”

In spite of both their growls, however, we could not well avoid the interview, albeit it was none of our seeking; and while I went down to summons the captain, Commander Nesbitt ordered the courses to be clewed up and the mainyard squared, so as to heave the ship to.

When I came up again the Frenchman and ourselves had both our heads to windward and were bobbing about abreast of each other, though still some distance apart; dipping deeply in the rough seaway and occasionally rolling broadside on, with the salt spray and spindrift coming in over our hammock nettings in sprinkles of foam.

“Hullo!” cried Larkyns, who was signal midshipman and was looking at the stranger with a diminutive telescope screwed-up to his starboard eye. “She’s hoisted the answering pen’ant under her ensign.”

“That means she’s going to use the International Code,” said the commander, overhearing him. “Signalman, keep a sharp lookout on her, and have your book handy to read her signal as soon as it goes up!”

“Ay, ay, sir,” replied the man, who was, like Larkyns, squinting his best at the other ship, although with a much bigger glass. “Something’s going up now, sir.”

“Yes, I see,” said Commander Nesbitt, as a string of flags were run up to the French ship’s main. “Have our answering pen’ant ready to hoist as soon as you can make it out. Look sharp, signalman! What does she say?”

“It’s ‘B D N,’ sir,” stammered out the man, who was rapidly turning over the pages of the signal book, seeking the meaning of the flags in that dictionary of the sign language of the sea, and missing what he sought to find in his hurry. “I—I—can’t find it, sir.”

“Can’t find your grandmother!” cried the Commander, impatiently, vexed at the delay. “Here, give me the signal book!”

“The hoist means ‘I want to communicate,’ I think,” observed Captain Farmer, who had come up quietly on the poop meanwhile, and stood behind the commander. “But the Frenchman might have saved himself the trouble of sending such a signal aloft; for, the mere fact of his already coming up to the wind and firing a gun, told us as much beforehand!”

“I should think so, sir; but it’s just like those Johnny Crapauds—always gabbling a lot about nothing!” rejoined the commander, who, at last, had now found the right page of the signal book. “Yes, sir, you’re quite right, as usual! I wish I had your memory for signals! He ‘wants to communicate.’ Signalman, hoist our answering pen’ant!”

At this order, the red-and-white barred pennant, which had long since been bent ready to the signal halliards, was run up to our main truck.

From this point of vantage, it flew out fair above all our sails and tophamper, visible all round the compass and telling the French corvette, still curvetting and prancing abreast of us and showing her bright copper sheathing as she rolled, that we had at last made out her signal and were waiting to learn what she had to say.

“I hope it’s really important,” said Captain Farmer to the commander; while Larkyns and the head signalman kept their glasses fixed on the opposite ship, ready to take in her next signal. “International courtesies are all very well in their way, but I don’t like being stopped for a mere exchange of bunting and that sort of balderdash, Nesbitt.”

“Nor I, sir,” agreed the commander. “Ha, they’re sending up another hoist now, and we’ll soon know all about it. What’s that now, signalman?”

“‘B L K,’ sir,” replied the yeoman of signals and Larkyns in one breath; and the former, running his fingers over the pages of the signal book, which Commander Nesbitt had returned to his custody, soon found that the interpretation of the flags thus clustered was, “We have passed a wreck, but were unable to stand by to see if any survivors were aboard her.”

“Oh!” exclaimed the captain on this being read out aloud, as the signalman put it down on the slate for entry into the ship’s log, according to the usual custom. “This is getting interesting. Hoist ‘Q R S’ after the answering pen’ant.”

“I say, Larkyns,” I asked, in an undertone of my friend the senior mid, as a string of square flags went up on our side—a yellow on top, a red square with a yellow cross in the middle, and a white flag with a blue centre the lowermost—“what does our signal mean, eh?”

“It means,” he whispered back, keeping his starboard eye still glued to his telescope, “‘whereabouts is that wreck you’re speaking of?’”

Some considerable delay now occurred on board the corvette; the Frenchies, in spite of their taking the initiative in the matter, being not as handy as our man in the manipulation of their flags.

At last, however, they sent up two hoists in rather a slovenly fashion, one going up after the other.

“Ha, that’s the latitude,” said Captain Farmer. “‘F K S’ and ‘G I V’ Signalman, what does that make, eh?”

“Forty-seven degrees, and fifteen minutes north latitude, sir.”

“Good, my man,” returned the captain, approvingly. “You’ve read that pretty smartly! Now, hoist the answering pennant; though, I suppose we’ll have to wait another month of Sundays for their longitude. No, by Jove! Messieurs les Français are a trifle quicker this time. ‘F N J’ and ‘G V L.’ How do you make them out, signalman? See if you can be as smart again as you were just now.”

“Ay, ay, sir,” returned the yeoman, all on his mettle and his eye the quicker to scan the alphabetical pages of his flag lexicon where the signals were catalogued in groups according to their subjects, this one being a numeral and, therefore, all the easier to read. “It’s longitude 9 degrees 15 minutes west, sir.”

“All right, put it down correctly, signalman,” said Captain Farmer; and, turning to the commander, he added, “Why, Nesbitt, it’s nearly in our direct course across the Bay, only we shall have a tighter squeeze, perhaps, in weathering Finisterre.”

“But, we can go a couple of points more free, sir,” observed Mr Quadrant, who had busied himself shaping a course on a chart by the binnacle as soon as he heard the latitude and longitude given. “That’ll be better than going about on the port tack, as I thought we should have to do, sir.”

“Yes—ha—humph! But I don’t like going too near Finisterre, though, Mr Quadrant, with a westerly gale threatening,” said the captain. “We cannot help ourselves, however, at present, for we must go after this wreck and see if there’re any unfortunate people aboard; though, I think those Frenchmen might have overhauled her themselves, instead of leaving it for us to do! Hoist ‘H V L,’ signalman! That will serve, Nesbitt, to tell them we’ll attend to the wreck. Let us fill and bear away again. We can’t afford to waste any more time palavering with our friend over yonder, who keeps us bowing and scraping like a veritable Frenchman as he is! Run up the signal now, signalman; and, Nesbitt, give him a parting dip of the ensign, and then brace round the yards and bear up!”

“Very good, sir,” replied the commander; and, as soon as the Frenchmen had hoisted their answering pennant to show that our signal had been taken in and understood, he turned to the poop-rail and sang out, “Bosun’s mate, pipe the watch to trim sails!”

The braces were then manned and the main yard swung, while our helm put hard a-starboard; when, the upper sails now filling and drawing again, our courses were dropped and the tacks hauled aboard, the clew garnets rattling as they were brought aft, and the ship put on her course.

We bore away, though, a couple of points more to the southward than before, steering sou’-sou’-west, towards the position of the wreck, as pointed out to us by our communicative friends, the strange ship.

“By Jove, sir,” exclaimed the commander as we bade farewell to the Frenchman, who also filled at the same time and went about on his way, both of us dipping our ensigns once more in salute, “we never thought of asking his name!”

“No more we did, Nesbitt,” said Captain Farmer; and the two stared at each other for a moment in silence, the captain ultimately breaking into a laugh. “But, that need not trouble you; for, I should know that corvette anywhere, I think, from the way she tumbles home from her water line abaft the beam. She’s the old Sérieuse for a thousand!”

“Indeed, sir?”

“Yes. She was one of the French fleet in the Black Sea when I was out there with old Dundas. I’ve been alongside her too often to forget her queer build!”

“But, I thought most of those French corvettes were wall-sided, sir?”

“Ay, true enough,” replied Captain Farmer, with a chuckle, as he came down the poop-ladder and turned to go into his cabin. “But, not all of them, Nesbitt, not all of them, my boy. I tell you, I would know the old Sérieuse anywhere, for they haven’t got another tub like her afloat.”

“The ‘old man’s’ right,” I heard the master say to Mr Stormcock when the captain had disappeared. “The corvette was on the right of our line when we bombarded Odessa; and I recollect she missed stays when tacking, and pretty nearly came aboard us.”

“By jingo,” replied Mr Stormcock, enthusiastically, “what an eye the old man has for a ship, and what a memory for signals! I never came across his equal.”

So thought I too; however, each day disclosed some fresh trait in our captain’s character, which surprised us all the more from his being such a very reserved man.

He was in the habit of keeping himself to himself until occasion arose to bring out his latent qualities.

Time, and a longer acquaintance with him, only taught us this pregnant fact, amongst other things!

While all the signalling had been going on, the wind was gradually freshening and the sea getting up; and by the time we made sail again the waves had put on their white caps, while a heavy, rolling swell had set in.

This met us almost full butt as we lay on our course and broke over our weather bow in columns of spray, washing the forecastle fore and aft and tumbling into the waist in a cataract of foam.

The water was knee-deep on the lee side of the deck, whenever the ship heeled over to port under the pressure of her canvas, passing out of the scuppers like a mill-race on her rising again and righting on an even keel.

The more the gale blew, however, the better the old Candahar appeared to like it; racing along in grand style, and kicking up her heels to the Frenchman who was pretty soon hull down astern, the distance between us widening each instant all the more rapidly from the fact of our proceeding in opposite directions!

At Two Bells, when the log was hove, we were found to be going over nine knots but the ship began to plunge so much presently, that Commander Nesbitt, after one or two anxious glances aloft, ordered the boatswain’s mate to call the hands to shorten sail, setting them to work the moment they came up from below, the topgallant sails and royals being taken in without delay and the royal yards sent down.

“I thought we were going to have bad luck,” observed Mr Stormcock, who had made his appearance again on the quarter-deck on hearing the boatswain’s pipe for all hands. “We haven’t seen the worst of it yet, I’m afraid.”