"No, of course not," I replied. "I"ve only just joined the service, I tell you."
"Ah, you jist wait then," said he, taking this observation of mine for a fresh lead. "I wer" out once, I tells yer, in the brig when the sea wos mountings "igh, an" the wind--Lor"! Yer shood "a "errd it blow! It took the mizzen to"s"le right clean out of "er; an" there wos four on us at the wheel, ay, "sides old Jellybelly."
"Why," I exclaimed, "who is he?"
"The quarter-master, in course," rejoined Larrikins indignantly. "Where wos yer raised not fur to know that afore? He allers goes by that name aboard ship, as everybody knows."
He was proceeding to tell me some thrilling and highly adventurous experiences he had had in the Channel and off the Isle of Wight, out on the autumn cruise in the training-brig, when the bugle sounded, and the boys all mustered at quarters before turning in for the night.
Staying on the upper deck for a time, Mick Donovan and I witnessed the mad race which presently took place on the order being given to sling hammocks; each boy scurrying to the nettings and hurrying below, hammock under arm, to rig up the same in the billet allotted to him on the lower deck.
Ere long, the idea struck both Mick and myself, almost simultaneously, that it was high time for us to think of our sleeping accommodation for the night; and so, we hurried down at the tail end of the crowd of other fellows, to seek the aid of our old friend the master-at-arms, the "Deus ex machina" of our hopes and fears.
Our new hammocks had been left in the police office of the ship under his immediate eye; so, on ascertaining the doubt that hara.s.sed our minds anent the night-lodging question, the "Jaunty," as heretofore, solved the difficulty at once by saying that we were to sling our hammocks on the middle deck, adjacent to the mess-place where we had dined and supped so sumptuously. Just then, as luck would have it, Larrikins, our old cicerone, came up abreast of where we were standing.
"Hi there!" sang out the master-at-arms. "Come and show these boys how to sling their hammocks."
"Yes, sir," replied Larrikins, with a sc.r.a.pe and a touch of his cap.
"Werry good, sir."
So saying, he set about knotting the lanyard of Irish Mick"s hammock; and, after slinging it from the hooks in the deck beams, over the mess- table where the famished lad had enjoyed such a rare "tuck out" that day, Larrikins went on to explain how the blankets should be "tucked in"
to the frail structure and wrapped round the occupant, so as to prevent him from tumbling out, which Larrikins declared, almost with tears in his eyes, he should deeply regret were such a catastrophe to occur.
"Lor"," he a.s.severated, "I"d never forgive myself--strike me silly if I would!"
"Faith an" sure, is it ai"ther expectin" me now for to schlape in that thare outlandish consarn yez are?" exclaimed Mick, to whom a hammock was an entire novelty. "It"s jokin", faith, ye are entirely, sure!"
However, after, like "vaulting ambition," overleaping himself when trying to jump into his unaccustomed bed-place, falling, equally unceremoniously, "on t"other side," Mick succeeded in ensconcing himself very comfortably in his hammock.
Now came my turn, my friend Larrikins being even more obsequious in his aid to me than to Mick.
The result amply justified his solicitude, for, although I managed to jump in all right, and even to go to sleep presently soundly enough, wearied out with all the excitement of the day, I was in the midst of a terrible dream, in which I thought I was at sea in the _Martin_ brig, in a fearful tempest, with the waters overwhelming us, and the vessel on the point of foundering, when I was awakened by a crash that seemed to resound through the ship, and then I"m sure I saw more stars than were ever seen by mortal in the bright blue firmament of heaven!
I had been "cut down," as the nautical phrase goes.
CHAPTER FIVE.
BOXING THE COMPa.s.s.
Sudden as had been my downfall, I was sufficiently awake, after the first momentary giddiness caused by the sharp crack with which my head came against the deck had pa.s.sed away, to have a shrewd idea as to who had brought about my sad calamity; the giggling and whispering, that went on around, in the semi-darkness, telling me, had I needed any such a.s.surance, that my fall was due to no accident.
"Hullo, my joker!" I sang out, recognising the voice of Larrikins as I fumbled about amongst the blankets and loose hammock cloth, feeling very much as if I were tightly tied up in a sack, part of the lanyard having taken a round turn round my neck. "I say, you first-cla.s.s boy, there!
You with the mug on you like a vegetable marrow! Wait till to-morrow morning and I"ll serve you out for this--see if I don"t!"
"Lor", yer doesn"t mean fur to say as how ye"ve gone a downer?" cried my tormentor, in a tone of great commiseration, lending a hand to extricate me from the folds of the blankets. "I never seed a chap go down so sudd.i.n.k. Lor"! Yer must hev made a slippery hitch when yer fastened up the end on yer lanyard to the hook. Lor", I am that orful sorry!"
"Oh yes," said I, shaking myself free from the last of my enc.u.mbrances and standing up erect, "you can just tell that to the marines!"
I was not, however, at all out of temper, having learnt long since from my father, even were I not fond of a bit of practical-joking myself, not to take umbrage at the skylarking of any of my comrades on board ship where no malice was really intended. As he told me, the more a fellow shows he"s "riled," the more his shipmates ever will tease him.
"If you want to have a happy life at sea, Tom," said he, "you must always bear everything good-humouredly--everything; aye, should you tumble from aloft and risk losing the number of your mess into the bargain!"
Hearing the row and the sound of our talking after "lights out!" had been called, one of the ship"s corporals came up with a lantern to see what was the matter; and he at once spotted Master Larrikins.
"Hi, young feller!" said he to that arch-conspirator; "what are you doing here? How"s it you haven"t turned in on the lower deck, in your proper billet?"
"The master-at-arms told me, sir, as how I wer fur to see as these novices wos slung their hammicks propingly," replied Larrikins glibly.
"An" I wer jist a-seein" to do it, sir."
"Aye, and a precious fine way you have done it, too!" rejoined the ship"s corporal, whose face I could clearly see by the light of his own lantern had a broad and beaming grin on it, as he proceeded to inspect the lashings now of my hammock, the foot-end of which was still attached to its hook in the deck beam. "Why, you"ve been and activally gone and triced the poor beggar up with a bit of spunyarn. No wonder he come down all standing on his cocoanut!"
The other fellows near me had wakened up by this, and there was a good sn.i.g.g.e.r all round; until the ship"s corporal, having rigged up my hammock again in the way it should have been rightly done at first, with a double turn of the lanyard round the hook, shoved me in and kindly tucked my blankets round me, before going off to complete his rounds; telling us, as he disappeared forwards in the darkness, that if we did not "keep quiet for the rest of the night we"d each get "four dozen" on the quarter-deck next day, besides being spread-eagled in the weather rigging as a caution to all novices about to join the ship!"
This warning, uttered in a deep, sepulchral voice, no doubt awed most of the new boys, but it only made me laugh to myself, as I was pretty well up to such "barney"; and, with little dread of any penalties in store-- though for that matter there was not much that could be said against me, for I certainly had not tried the strength or the softness of the ship"s planks of my own free-will--I cuddled into my hammock and went to sleep as soundly as if I were in my own old bed at home, in spite of the snoring and choking noises made in his dreams by that ugly chap Moses Reeks, who occupied the next hammock to mine.
"Whe-e-e-e-e! Who-e-o-e-o! Whe-eep!"
So the boatswain"s whistle rang out through the ship with a shrill iteration that pierced my ears in the fresh and chilly air next morning, awaking me, if possible, in even yet more startling fashion than Larrikins" successful trick of the previous evening.
"Whee-e-ah! Whee-e-ah!"
There it was again; and, should this not be sufficient to disturb the slumbers of heavy sleepers, the sharp boatswain"s pipe was supplemented by the hoa.r.s.e shouts of his "mates" up and down the hatchways far and near, a very legion of voices!
"Rouse out! Rouse out! Rouse out! Show a leg."
I really thought the nor"-east wind had brought up a great haul with the flood-tide, and that innumerable costers were calling out some strange fish in the streets round Bonfire Corner; while our white c.o.c.katoo, "Ally Sloper," was having a bit of fun with himself and mother by imitating the cry!
Presently, though, a rough shake of my hammock and the hail of one of the boatswain"s mates close by me told a different tale.
"Here, out of this, my lad!" said he, giving a twist to the swinging concern that landed me on the deck in a twinkling. "You can"t stop there snoozing any longer! Don"t you see the sun is scorching your eyes out?"
He had a good deal of imagination, had that man; for it would have puzzled the "Philadelphia lawyer," whom father was so fond of quoting, to have discovered the ghost of a ray of sunlight this cold, foggy, February morning at Four Bells!
The rest of the novices--there being, as you know, ten other "unclothed"
boys besides myself--had been roughly aroused in like fashion; and to a by-stander all of us must have looked a forlorn lot of shivering creatures, adrift there on the cheerless deck in the half light of early day, not knowing what to do with ourselves until somebody told us what to do and bearing, I fancy, a strikingly strong resemblance to a flock of lambs in some strange pasture deserted by their dams!
I make a mistake there, however, for the muttered growling exclamations I heard uttered by one of the warrant-officers, who came past where we stood cl.u.s.tered together, certainly sounded uncommonly like the name of the lambs" mothers I have just mentioned, showing that its "eidolon"
remained.
The observation made by this officer, who, to my surprise, I subsequently found was the boatswain, brought our old police friend, the master-at-arms, on the scene.
"Here, boys," said he to us, "you must bestir yourselves, and not stand star-gazing there, like so many country b.u.mpkins at a fair! Tom Bowling, if you"re the son of your father, you ought to know that you"ve got to unsling your hammock when the "lash up and stow" is sounded! And you, too, my Irish-Italian friend over there, roll up your hammock, my lad!"
"Sure, an" is it manin" me yez afther?" inquired Mick Donovan, unhitching the lanyard of his hammock from the hook above in a brace of shakes. "Faith, it"s makin" a rowly-powly puddin" of it I will, sor, entirely!"
The "Jaunty" grinned at Mick"s naive remark, but soon mastered the difficulty of teaching us by pa.s.sing the job on to other hands.