Shireen and her Friends Part 17

"No, Tom," I replied. "I shall end my days up here. I--"

I said no more. For at that moment a rough red face appeared over the top.

It was the honest sailor-man who had brought Tom Brandy on board, and he soon solved the difficulty by taking me down under his arm.

But I gained confidence after this, and was soon able to run up even to the top-gallant crosstrees, and come down again feet first, and hand after hand, just like Tom Brandy himself.

I'll never forget the first day I heard the guns go off. Tom told me it was nothing. That we were merely chasing a slave-ship, and that the moment she lay to our brave sailors would board her, and very soon make an end of the Arabs.

Tom and I had crept into the largest gun that day, having found the tompion out. She was called a bow-chaser, whatever that may be, and she stood on a pivot away forward. The sun had been fearfully hot that forenoon, but Tom came aft to the quarter-deck, where I was lying panting, with my mouth open.

"Very hot, isn't it?" said Tom.

"I feel roasting," I replied.

"Well, follow me," he said. "I know where it is dark and cool enough for anything. The tompion is out of the 56-pounder."

"Whatever do you mean? What is a tompion, Tom? And what is a 56-pounder?"

"Come on and see, Shireen."

Then we went to the gun.

"Follow your leader," cried Tom, and in he crawled and soon was lost to view.

"But why, Tom?" I cried; "it must be dirty as well as dark. I'm afraid of soiling my coat."

Tom looked out of the gun to laugh.

"Oh, Shireen!" he said, "the idea of a Royal Navy gun being dirty. I wonder what the gunner would say if you told him?"

So, half ashamed of myself, I jumped in. It was delightfully nice and cool, and so my companion and I fell sound asleep.

I was awakened before Tom by a voice. "Can't load the bow-chaser, sir.

Cats have both gone to sleep in it, and I can't get 'em out."

"Stick in a fuse," cried the lieutenant, "and rouse them out."

Immediately after there was a rang-bang let off behind us, and Tom and I were blown clean out of the gun.

We weren't hurt, Warlock, for we both alighted on our feet; but, my blue eyes! I did get a scare.

Tom said that was nothing. He often went to sleep in the gun, and, as to being blown out with a fuse, it didn't even singe one, and was quicker than walking.

But when the battle began in earnest, and the first gun went off, I bolted aft with my tail like a bottle-brush, and dived down below.

I tore in through the wardroom, and did not consider myself safe until I got into my master's bed.

The battle didn't last long. Tom told me it was only a small slaver.

But she was captured, and towed astern, and Tom said there was some talk of hanging one or two of the Arabs, but I didn't know anything about this. I was very pleased the fight was over.

Three slaves were brought on board. One was a little boy, with no more clothes on than a mermaid. And he was so black, children, that when he crawled up and put his arms round my neck, I quite expected to see a black ring round me next time I looked in the gla.s.s.

But the blackness didn't come off.

Strangely enough, this poor little black child and I grew very great friends indeed.

I think that by this time, however, there wasn't an officer or man in the ship, fore or aft, that didn't love me very much.

CHAPTER TWELVE.

OLD SHIPMATES.

Tom and I, continued Shireen, weren't the only pets on board the _Venom_. There was a monkey though, and a very large one he was. When he stood up he was as big as a second-cla.s.s boy. The sailors had dressed him as a marine, and given him a wooden gun, and taught him to shake hands and salute. His name was Joe; but I'm sure he wasn't happy, I often saw tears in his eyes, or thought I did. Perhaps he had been taken from his home, far away in the beautiful forests of Africa, and had left a wife and children behind him.

We had a mongoose too--a sly old grey creature that the men petted. But Tom never took to him, and used sometimes to whack him when n.o.body was looking.

We had a large chameleon just like Chammy,--and I wonder where Chammy is--our ship's chameleon lived in an old coffee-pot that was turned down on its side like a kennel in the corner of the doctor's cabin. He was chained to this just like a doggie, and used to catch little c.o.c.kroaches and hammer-legged flies for himself all day.

In another part of the doctor's cabin was a lizard four feet long, that looked terribly fierce and dangerous, he was also secured with a chain.

In a hatbox, in the doctor's cabin, lived a beautiful bronze-winged pigeon, who purred like a cat. Tom said he must be awfully good to eat, but he wouldn't venture into the cabin for anything, owing to the dragon that was chained in the corner.

We had in the wardroom a grey parrot with a red tail that he was very proud of. And all the week through the parrot was allowed to go on deck if he liked, but not on Sundays, because once when he came to church in the middle of the service he set everybody laughing by calling the parson "Old Boots."

The sailors now began to teach me tricks, and seeing that it pleased them very much, I tried to learn my lessons as quickly as possible.

On fine evenings then at smoking time, the men would call me forward, and a ring would be formed near to the winch and between the bows.

Jumping backwards and forwards over a stick, or over a man's clasped hands, was nothing. Heigho! my dear children, this happened twenty years ago, although I remember it as if it were but yesterday. Well, I was supple and strong, and lithe of limb in those dear days, being little more than a kitten, and a man could hardly hold a stick so high that I couldn't spring over it.

As soon as I was fairly well accomplished at this work, a piece of iron wire, bent in a half hoop, was used instead of the stick, and every night the sailor who was teaching me brought the two ends of the wire nearer and nearer, until at last it was a whole hoop and nothing else.

Next he covered the hoop half over with paper, leaving just a hole, but I was determined not to be beaten, and through I went.

One evening, to my surprise, the hoop was all covered with thin paper; nevertheless, when the man spoke kindly to me, and asked me to leap, through I went, and my education in leaping was supposed to be complete.

This man was afterwards called aft to the quarter-deck, and there, to the delight and amus.e.m.e.nt of the officers, and the envy of the mongoose, who couldn't jump a bit, I went through the whole performance, and was applauded sky-high.

"p.u.s.s.y," said my master laughing, as he took me and fondled me in his arms, "I never knew before that you were a play actor."

There were no rats on board the _Venom_, so Tom and I had an idle time of it. When Tom first came on board ship in Australia, there had been a large number of these nasty creatures in the vessel. They used to eat everything, and sometimes they got into the men's hammocks for warmth, and slept with them all throughout the watch-in. Put Tom cleared the ship by degrees.

"That must have been fine fun," said Warlock; "but it must have been dull times for Tom and you--no rats, no sport."