"You"re a cheerful-looking lot to start out with to win the cup back!"
was his comment. "Oars ready! "Way together!"
The crew, like a child that suddenly tires of being naughty, bent to their oars, and the boat slid through the water under long, swinging strokes....
Regatta-day broke calm and clear. The hands were piped to breakfast, and the Quartermaster of the Morning Watch, as the latest authority on the vagaries of the barometer, entered the Petty Officers" mess with the air of one in the intimate confidence of the High G.o.ds.
"Gla.s.s "igh an" steady," he announced, helping himself to sausage and mashed potatoes. "We"ll "ave it calm till mebbe five o"clock, then it"ll blow from the south"ard. That"s down the course. But we won"t "ave no rain to-day."
The Captain of the Forecastle, who read his "Old Moore"s Almanac," and was susceptible to signs and portents, confirmed the optimism of the Quartermaster.
"I "ad a dream last night," he said. "I was a-walkin" with my missus alongside the Serpentine--in London, that is. There was swans sailin"
on it, an" we was "eavin" bits of bread to "em. "Fred," she says, "you"ll "ave it beautiful for your regatta. You"ll win," she says, "the Stokers" Cutters, the Vet"rans" Skiff"s, the Orficers" Gigs, an"
the All-comers.""
"That"s along of you eatin" lobster for supper last night," said the Ship"s Painter, a sceptic who had a sovereign on a race not mentioned by the Captain of the Forecastle"s wife. "Wot about the perishin"
Boys" Cutters? Didn"t your old Dutch say nothin" about them?"
The seer shook his head and performed intricate evolutions with a pin in the cavernous recesses of his mouth.
"Mebbe she would "ave if she"d "ad the chanst," was the reply. "But she didn"t "ave time to say no more afore the Reveille interrupted "er, an" I "ad to turn out."
The Quartermaster of the Morning Watch concluded his repast. "Well,"
he said, "Mebbe she"ll tell you the rest to-night. Then we"ll know "oo"s "oo, as the sayin" is. But there"s one crew as I"ll put my shirt on, an" that"s the Orficers" Gigs."
""Ow about the Boys" Cutters?" demanded the Ship"s Painter whose sovereign was in jeopardy.
"_An"_ the Vet"rans" Skiffs," echoed the Captain of the Forecastle, "what my wife mentioned? "Fred," she says----"
"An" the All-comers," interrupted the Captain of the Side, "wiv the Chief Buffer[2] c.o.xin" the launch?"
The Quartermaster of the Morning Watch made a motion with an enormous freckled paw as if stroking an invisible kitten. "I ain"t sayin"
nothin" against "em. Nothin" at all. What I says is, "Wait an" see."
I ain"t a bettin" man, not meself. But if anyone was to fancy an even "arf quid----"
The shrill whistle of the call-boy"s pipe clove the babel of the crowded mess-deck.
"A-a-away Racing Whaler"s Crew!"
shouted the cracked high tenor. "Man your boat!"
"There you are!" said the Blacksmith, a silent, bearded man. "What are we all "angin" on to the slack for? Come on deck. That"s the first race."
Regatta-day, even in War-time, was a day of high carnival. The dozen or so of Battleships concerned, each with its crew of over a thousand men, looked forward to the event much in the same spirit as a Derby crowd that gathers overnight on Epsom Downs. The other Squadrons of the vast Battle-fleet were disposed to ignore the affair; they had their own regattas to think about, either in retrospection or as an event to come. But in the Squadron immediately concerned it was, next to the annihilation of the German Fleet, the chief consideration of their lives, and had been for some weeks past.
For weeks, and in some cases months, the racing crews of launches, cutters, gigs, and whalers, officers and men alike, had carried through an arduous training interrupted only by attentions to the King"s enemies and the inclemencies of the Northern spring. And now that the day had come, both spectators and crews moved in an atmosphere of holiday and genial excitement heated by intership rivalry to fever-point.
A regatta is one of the safety valves through which the ships"
companies of the silent Fleet in the North can rid themselves of a little superfluous steam. Only those who have shared the repressed monotony of their unceasing vigil can appreciate what such a day means.
To be spared for a few brief hours the irksome round of routine, to smoke Woodbines the livelong day; to share, in the grateful sunlight, some vantage point with a "Raggie," and join in the full-throated, rapturous roars of excitement that sweep down the mile-long lane of ships abreast the sweating crews. This is to taste something of the fierce exhilaration of the Day that the Fleet is waiting for, and has awaited throughout the weary years.
A Dockyard tug, capable of accommodating several hundred men, lay alongside. The ship had swung on the tide at an angle to the course that obscured full view of the start. Those of the ship"s company who desired a full complete spectacle from start to finish were to go away and anchor at some convenient point in the line, from which an uninterrupted panorama could be obtained. The device had other advantages: by anchoring midway down the course a flagging crew could be spurred on to mightier efforts by shouts and execrations, the beating of gongs, hooting syren and fog-horns, whistles and impa.s.sioned entreaties.
Accordingly the more ardent supporters of the various crews, armed with all the implements of noise and encouragement that their ingenuity could devise, embarked. They swarmed like bees over the deck and bridge-house, they clung to the rigging and funnel stays, and perched like monkeys on the mast and derrick. Thus freighted the craft moved off amid deafening cheers, and took up a position midway between two Battleships moored in the centre of the line. The anchor was dropped, and the closely packed spectators, producing mouth-organs and cigarettes, prepared to while away the time until the commencement of the first race.
They belonged to a West-country ship--that is to say, one manned from the Dockyard Port of Plymouth. The master of the tug, whose interest in such matters was, to say the least of it, cosmopolitan, had anch.o.r.ed between two Portsmouth-manned Battleships. The position he had selected commanded a full view of the course, and there his responsibilities in the affair ended. On the other hand, the crews of the two Battleships in question, a.s.sembled in full strength on their respective forecastles in antic.i.p.ation of the forthcoming race, regarded the arrival of the tug in the light of a diversion sent straight from Heaven.
The tug"s cable had scarcely ceased to rattle through the hawse-pipe when the opening shots, delivered through a megaphone, rang out across the water.
"_"Ullo! Web-feet!_" bellowed a raucous voice. "_Yeer! Where be tu?_" A roar of laughter followed this sally.
The occupants of the tug were taken by surprise. Their interests had hitherto been concentrated in the string of whalers being towed down to the distant starting-point by a picket boat. Before they could rally their forces a cross-fire of rude chaff, winged by uproarious laughter, had opened on either side. Catch-word and jest, counter and repartee utterly unintelligible to anyone outside Lower-deck circles were hurled to and fro like s...o...b..a.l.l.s. Every discreditable incident of their joint careers as units of that vast fighting force, personalities that would have brought blushes to the cheeks of a Smithfield porter, the whole couched in the obscure jargon of Cat.w.a.ter and Landport taverns, rang backwards and forwards across the water, and withal the utmost good humour and enjoyment wreathing their faces with smiles.
The distant report of a gun sounded and a far-off roar of voices announced that the first race had started; straight-way the tumult subsided, and an expectant hush awaited the approach of the line of boats moving towards them like a row of furious water-beetles.
The race drew nearer, and ship after ship of the line took up the deep-toned roar. The names of the ships, invoked by their respective ship"s companies as might the ancients have called upon their G.o.ds, blended in one great volume of sound. The more pa.s.sionately interested supporters of the crews followed the strung-out compet.i.tors in steam-boats, and added their invocations to the rest.
A rifle cracked on board the end ship of the line, and the crew of the leading boat collapsed in crumpled heaps above their oars. The race was over. On board a ship half-way down the line a frantic outburst of cheering suddenly predominated above all other sounds, and continued unabated as the rifle cracked twice more in quick succession, announcing that the second and third boats had ended the race.
A hoist of flags at the masthead of the Flagship proclaimed the names of the first three crews, dipped, and was succeeded by the number of the next race. Again the gun in the bows of the Umpire"s steam-boat sped the next race upon its way, and once more the tumult of men"s voices rose and swelled to a gale of sound that swept along the line, and died to the tumultuous cheering of a single ship.
A couple of hours pa.s.sed thus, and there remained one race before dinner, the Officers" Gigs. The events of the forenoon had considerably enhanced the reputation of the Captain of the Forecastle as a prophet. Furthermore, the result of the Boys" Race had enriched the Ship"s Painter to the extent of a sovereign. It needed but the victory of the Officers" Gigs to place the ship well in sight of the Silver c.o.c.k, which was the Squadron Trophy for the largest number of points obtained by any individual ship.
The starting-point was the rallying-place for every available steam- and motor-boat in the Squadron, crowded with enthusiastic supporters of the different crews. The Dockyard tug, with its freight of hoa.r.s.e yet still vociferous sailor-men, had weighed her anchor, and moved down to the end of the line preparatory to steaming in the wake of the last race.
The Umpire, in the stern of an officious picket-boat, was apparently the only dispa.s.sionate partic.i.p.ator in the animated scene. The long, graceful-looking boats, each with its crew of six, their anxious-faced c.o.xswains crouched in the sterns, and tin flags bearing the numbers of their ships in the bows, were being shepherded into position. A tense silence was closing down on the spectators. It deepened as the line straightened out, and the motionless boats awaited the signal with their oars poised in readiness for the first stroke.
"Up a little, number seven!" shouted the starter wearily through his megaphone. Two hours of this sort of thing robs even the Officers"
Gigs of much outstanding interest to the starter.
"Goo-o-o!" whispered one of the watching men. ""E don"t "arf know "is job, the c.o.xswain of that boat."
The boat in question with a single slow stroke moved up obediently.
"Stand by!" sang the metallic voice again. Then--
_Bang!_ They were off.
As if released by the concussion, a wild pandemonium burst from the waiting spectators" throats. The light boats sprang forward like things alive, and in their churning wakes came the crowded steam-boats.
For perhaps two minutes the racing boats travelled as if drawn by invisible threads of equal length. Then first one and then another dropped a little. The bow of one of the outside boats broke an oar, and before the oarsman could get the spare one into the crutch the boat slipped to the tail of the race. The spare oar shipped, however, she maintained her position, and her crew continued pulling against hopeless odds with pretty gallantry.
Half-way down the mile course there were only four boats in it. The Flagship"s boat led by perhaps a yard, with a rival on either side of her pulling stroke for stroke. Away to the right and well clear, the Young Doctor urged his crew on with sidelong glances out of the corner of his eye at the other boats.
"You"ve got "em!" he said. "You"ve got "em cold. Steady does it!
Quicken a fraction, Number One. Stick it, Bow, stick it, lad!"
The Flagship"s boat had increased her lead to half a length ahead of her two consorts: the Young Doctor"s crew held her neck and neck. Then the Young Doctor cleared his dry throat and spoke with the tongues of men and fallen angels. He coaxed and encouraged, he adjured and abused them stroke by stroke towards their goal. The crew, with set, white faces and staring eyes fixed on each other"s backs, responded like heroes, but Double-O Gerrard was obviously tiring and the First Lieutenant"s breath was coming in sobs. They were pulling themselves out.