Part 5 (1/2)

It was the Cape winter when I joined the gunboat. The hills were covered with purple and green, the air was deliciously cool, and the far-away mountain-tops were clad in virgin snow. It was twelve o'clock noon when I took my traps on board, and found my new messmates seated around the table at tiffin. The gunroom, called the wardroom by courtesy--for the after cabin was occupied by the lieutenant commanding--was a little morsel of an apartment, which the table and five cane-bottomed chairs entirely filled. The officers were five-- namely, a little round-faced, dimple-cheeked, good-natured fellow, who was our second-master; a tall and rather awkward-looking young gentleman, our mids.h.i.+pman; a lean, pert, and withal diminutive youth, brimful of his own importance, our a.s.sistant-paymaster; a fair-haired, bright-eyed, laughing boy from Cornwall, our sub-lieutenant; and a ”wee wee man,” dapper, clean, and tidy, our engineer, admitted to this mess because he was so thorough an exception to his cla.s.s, which is celebrated more for the unctuosity of its outer than for the smoothness of its inner man.

”Come along, old fellow,” said our navigator, addressing me as I entered the messroom, bobbing and bowing to evade fracture of the cranium by coming into collision with the transverse beams of the deck above--”come along and join us, we don't dine till four.”

”And precious little to dine upon,” said the officer on his right.

”Steward, let us have the rum,” [Note 1] cried the first speaker.

And thus addressed, the steward shuffled in, bearing in his hand a black bottle, and apparently in imminent danger of choking himself on a large mouthful of bread and b.u.t.ter. This functionary's dress was remarkable rather for its simplicity than its purity, consisting merely of a pair of dirty canvas pants, a pair of purser's shoes--innocent as yet of blacking--and a greasy flannel s.h.i.+rt. But, indeed, uniform seemed to be the exception, and not the rule, of the mess, for, while one wore a blue serge jacket, another was arrayed in white linen, and the rest had neither jacket nor vest.

The table was guiltless of a cloth, and littered with beer-bottles, biscuits, onions, sardines, and pats of b.u.t.ter.

”Look out there, Waddles!” exclaimed the sub-lieutenant; ”that beggar Dawson is having his own whack o' grog and everybody else's.”

”Dang it! I'll have _my_ tot to-day, I know,” said the a.s.sistant-paymaster, s.n.a.t.c.hing the bottle from Dawson, and helping himself to a very liberal allowance of the ruby fluid.

”What a cheek the fellow's got!” cried the mids.h.i.+pman, s.n.a.t.c.hing the gla.s.s from the table and bolting the contents at a gulp, adding, with a gasp of satisfaction as he put down the empty tumbler, ”The chap thinks n.o.body's got a soul to be saved but himself.”

”Soul or no soul,” replied the youthful man of money as he gazed disconsolately at the empty gla.s.s, ”my _spirit's_ gone.”

”Blessed,” said the engineer, shaking the black bottle, ”if you devils have left me a drain! see if I don't look out for A1 to-morrow.”

”Where's the doctor's grog?” cried the sub-lieutenant.

”Ay, where's the doctor's?” said another.

”Where is the doctor's?” said a third.

And they all said ”Where is the doctor's?” and echo answered ”Where?”

”Steward!” said the middy.

”Ay, ay, sir.”

”See if that beggarly b.u.mboat-man is alongside, and get me another pat of b.u.t.ter and some soft tack; get the grub first, then tell him I'll pay to-morrow.”

These and such like sc.r.a.ps of conversation began to give me a little insight into the kind of mess I had joined and the character of my future messmates. ”Steward,” said I, ”show me my cabin.” He did so; indeed, he hadn't far to go. It was the aftermost, and consequently the smallest, although I _ought_ to have had my choice. It was the most miserable little box I ever reposed in. Had I owned such a place on sh.o.r.e, I _might_ have been induced to keep rabbits in it, or guinea-pigs, but certainly not pigeons. Its length was barely six feet, its width four above my cot and two below, and it was minus sufficient standing-room for any ordinary-sized sailor; it was, indeed, a cabin for a commodore--I mean Commodore Nutt--and was ventilated by a scuttle seven inches in diameter, which could only be removed in harbour, and below which, when we first went to sea, I was fain to hang a leather hat-box to catch the water; unfortunately the bottom rotted out, and I was then at the mercy of the waves.

My cabin, or rather--to stick to the plain unvarnished truth--my burrow, was alive with scorpions, c.o.c.kroaches, ants, and other ”crawlin'

ferlies.”

”That e'en to name would be unlawfu'.”

My dispensary was off the steerage, and sister-cabin to the pantry. To it I gained access by a species of crab-walking, squeezing myself past a large bra.s.s pump, and edging my body in sideways. The sick came one by one to the dispensary door, and there I saw and treated each case as it arrived, dressed the wounds and bruises and putrefying sores, and bandaged the bad legs. There was no sick-berth attendant; to be sure the lieutenant-in-command, at my request, told off ”a little cabin-boy”

for my especial use. I had no cause for delectation on such an acquisition, by no means; he was not a model cabin-boy like what you see in theatres, and I believe will never become an admiral. He managed at times to wash out the dispensary, or gather c.o.c.kroaches, and make the poultices--only in doing the first he broke the bottles, and in performing the last duty he either let the poultice burn or put salt in it; and, finally, he smashed my pot, and I kicked him forward, and demanded another. _He_ was slightly better, only he was seldom visible; and when I set him to do anything, he at once went off into a sweet slumber; so I kicked him forward too, and had in despair to become my own menial. In both dispensary and burrow it was quite a difficult business to prevent everything going to speedy destruction. The best portions of my uniform got eaten by c.o.c.kroaches or moulded by damp, while my instruments required cleaning every morning, and even that did not keep rust at bay.

Imagine yourself dear reader, in any of the following interesting positions:--

Very thirsty, and nothing but boiling hot newly distilled water to drink; or wis.h.i.+ng a cool bath of a morning, and finding the water in your can only a little short of 212 degrees Fahrenheit.