Part 8 (1/2)

”Oh, it's _him_ you mean, is it? In course I've knowed him ever since I wos at school.”

A general laugh interrupted the speaker.

”At school!” cried Nickel Sling, who approached the group at that moment with a carving knife in his hand--he seldom went anywhere without an instrument of office in his hand--”At school! Wal now, that beats creation. If ye wos, I'm sartin ye only larned to forgit all ye orter to have remembered. I'd take a bet now, ye wosn't at school as long as I've been settin' on this here windla.s.s.”

”Yer about right, Sling, it 'ud be unpossible for me to be as _long_ as you anywhere, 'cause everybody knows I'm only five fut two, whereas you're six fut four!”

”Hear, hear!” shouted d.i.c.k Barnes--a man with a huge black beard, who the reader may perhaps remember was the first to ”raise the oil.”

”It'll be long before you make another joke like that, Gurney. Come, now, give us a song, Gurney, do; there's the cap'n's darter standin' by the foremast, a-waitin' to hear ye. Give us `Long, long ago.'”

”Ah! that's it, give us a song,” cried the men. ”Come, there's a good fellow.”

”Well, it's so long ago since I sung that song, s.h.i.+pmates,” replied Gurney, ”that I've bin and forgot it; but Tim Rokens knows it; where's Rokens?”

”He's in the watch below.”

In sea parlance, the men whose turn it is to take rest after their long watch on deck are somewhat facetiously said to belong to the ”watch below.”

”Ah! that's a pity; so we can't have that 'ere partickler song. But I'll give ye another, if ye don't object.”

”No, no. All right; go ahead, Gurney! Is there a chorus to it?”

”Ay, in course there is. Wot's a song without a chorus? Wot's plum-duff without the plums? Wot's a s.h.i.+p without a 'elm? It's my opinion, s.h.i.+pmates, that a song without a chorus is no better than it should be. It's wus nor nothin'. It puts them wot listens in the blues an' the man wot sings into the stews--an' sarve him right. I wouldn't, no, I wouldn't give the f.a.g-end o' nothin' mixed in bucket o' salt water for a song without a chorus--that's flat; so here goes.”

Having delivered himself of these opinions in an extremely vigorous manner, and announced the fact that he was about to begin, Gurney cleared his throat and drew a number of violent puffs from his pipe in quick succession, in order to kindle that instrument into a glow which would last through the first verse and the commencement of the chorus.

This he knew was sufficient, for the men, when once fairly started on the chorus, would infallibly go on to the end with or without his a.s.sistance, and would therefore afford him time for a few restorative whiffs.

”It hain't got no name, lads.”

”Never mind, Gurney--all right--fire away.”

”Oh, I once know'd a man as hadn't got a nose, An' this is how he come to hadn't-- One cold winter night he went and got it froze-- By the pain he was well-nigh madden'd.

(_Chorus_.) Well-nigh madden'd, By the pain he was well-nigh madden'd.

”Next day it swoll up as big as my head, An' it turn'd like a piece of putty; It kivered up his mouth, oh, yes, so it did, So he could not smoke his cutty.

(_Chorus_.) Smoke his cutty, So he could not smoke his cutty.

”Next day it grew black, and the next day blue, An' tough as a junk of leather; (Oh! he yelled, so he did, fit to pierce ye through)-- An' then it fell off altogether!

(_Chorus_.) Fell off altogether, An' then it fell off altogether!

”But the morial is wot you've now got to hear, An' it's good--as sure as a gun; An' you'll never forget it, my messmates dear, For this song it hain't got none!

(_Chorus_.) Hain't got none, For this song it hain't got none!”

The applause that followed this song was most enthusiastic, and evidently gratifying to Gurney, who a.s.sumed a modest deprecatory air as he proceeded to light his pipe, which had been allowed to go out at the third verse, the performer having become so engrossed in his subject as to have forgotten the interlude of puffs at that point.

”Well sung, Gurney. Who made it?” inquired Phil Briant, an Irishman, who, besides being a jack-of-all-trades and an able-bodied seaman, was at that time acting-a.s.sistant to the cook and steward, the latter--a half Spaniard and half negro, of Californian extraction--being unwell.

”I'm bound not to tell,” replied Gurney, with a conscious air.