Part 10 (1/2)

”Well done, my lad; I see you have been on board a s.h.i.+p before!” cried out the instructor, as I at once proceeded now to climb up to the crosstrees and over the head of the mast. ”Look alive, you other chaps!

That boy there will have done the job while you are thinking about it.

Stir your stumps!”

'Ugly' was the last of the lot; and, as I came down on the weather or starboard side of the s.h.i.+p, the wind then blowing from the nor'ard and eastward, he was just trying to creep through 'the lubber's hole' into the top.

”No you don't,” shouted up the instructor after him. ”You must climb out by the futtock shrouds, as every proper sailor does.”

Seeing, however, that poor 'Ugly' was quite in a fog, he turned to me as I stepped down from the chains and stood up in front of him, touching my cap to report myself as having accomplished my task.

”I say, my boy,” said he, ”what's your name?”

Of course I had to reply to this, and so I told him--

”Tom Bowling, sir.”

”Ha!” he exclaimed, apparently surprised. ”Any relation of that chap in the song who 'went aloft and did his duty'?”

I grinned.

”Yes, sir, I believe so,” I said. ”Father says as how our family is descended from him.”

”I can quite believe it,” observed the instructor kindly, with a pleasant smile on his face. ”At all events, a sailor's blood runs in your veins, my lad; and, as you're such a good climber and know your way up the ratlines, just go up now and show that lubber of a greenhorn how to get up the futtock shrouds without tumbling, and so over the masthead.”

Accordingly, I raced aloft the second time and soon fetched up to 'Ugly,' who, in a mortal funk, was trying to step out from the lower rigging on to the futtock shrouds, which, I may explain for the benefit of those who have not been to sea, stretch out laterally from the mast, and not in towards it, like the ordinary standing rigging below.

In spite of his difficulty, however, the surly brute now accepted my help with a very ill grace; muttering under his breath to himself some very unfriendly wishes in my respect, as, with some difficulty, I lugged him up into the top, almost by the scruff of his neck.

The rest of the journey up and down was easy enough; and 'Ugly,'

rendered bold by having crossed his goal, the crosstrees, disdaining any further help from me, now started, after he had arrived in the top, again on the return voyage to climb down the shrouds by himself.

But hardly had he got his foot over the side of the top than his courage failed him; and I, looking up, on account of feeling the rigging shake, for I had gone down in advance from his telling me he 'didn't want no help from sich a cove as me,' saw that he was trembling like an aspen leaf, while his face was as pale as death.

”Hold on,” I cried, ”I'll be up with you in half a minute, and lend you a hand!”

I don't know whether he heard me or not as I scrambled up hastily towards him; but the next instant, losing his grip of the rope he was hanging on to somehow or other, he fell back on top of me, uttering a wild yell that was almost a scream, and which could have been heard ash.o.r.e at Gosport!

CHAPTER EIGHT.

”THE SWEETS OF FRIENDs.h.i.+P.”

”How did you manage it, my boy?” panted out the instructor, out of breath by his rapid climb up the rigging to my aid, as I held on desperately to the shrouds, against which I pressed the body of my unconscious s.h.i.+pmate with my own, to prevent him from falling. ”Lord!

My lad, I thought you were both gone! Thank G.o.d, you saved him!”

But I could not tell him then, or after, how I contrived to catch 'Ugly'

when he let go his hold; and to this very day, though it is pretty nearly six years or more agone, and many things have happened since even stranger, too, I put down the spontaneous act that prompted me to stretch out my hand in the nick of time and grip him by his waistbelt before it was too late, to the interposition of Providence--an intervention, indeed, not only on his behalf, but on my own, as subsequent events proved, though I will speak of this when the proper time comes.

The instructor, even in his hurry aloft to our a.s.sistance, had managed to s.n.a.t.c.h up on the way a coil of half-inch; and with this he now proceeded, breathing heavily the while from his exertions, to secure 'Ugly' temporarily to the ratlines until a whip could be rigged for sending down the still insensible fellow to the deck below.

This was a great relief to me, for it was as much as I could do to support his body, although, as I've said, I pressed him against the rigging, the chap weighing over ten stone at least, I should think, as he was a thickset yokel and inclined to be corpulent.