The Red Eric Part 8

"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, shipmates," 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 ship without a 'elm? It's my opinion, shipmates, 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.

"Ah, then, yer right, my boy, for it's below the average entirely."

"Come, Phil, none o' yer chaff," cried d.i.c.k Barnes, "that song desarves somethin' arter it. Suppose now, Phil, that you wos to go below and fetch the bread-kid."

"Couldn't do it," replied Phil, looking solemn, "on no account wotiver."

"Oh, nonsense, why not?"

"'Cause its unpossible. Why, if I did, sure that surly compound o' all sorts o' human blood would pitch into me with the carvin'-knife."

"Who? Tarquin?" cried d.i.c.k Barnes, naming the steward.

"Ay, sure enough that same--Tarquin's his name, an it's kuriously befittin' the haythen, for of all the cross-grained mixtures o' buffalo, bear, bandicoot, and crackadile I iver seed, he's out o' sight--"

"Did I hear any one mention my name?" inquired the steward himself who came aft at that moment. He was a wild Spanish-like fellow, with a handsome-enough figure, and a swart countenance that might have been good-looking but for the thickish lips and nose and the bad temper that marked it. Since getting into the tropics, the sailors had modified their costumes considerably, and as each man had in some particular allowed himself a slight play of fancy, their appearance, when grouped together, was varied and picturesque. Most of them wore no shoes, and the caps of some were, to say the least, peculiar. Tarquin wore a broad-brimmed straw hat, with a conical crown, and a red silk sash tied round his waist.

"Yes, Tarquin," replied Barnes, "we _wos_ engaged in makin'

free-an'-easy remarks on you; and Phil Briant there gave us to understand that you wouldn't let us have the bread--kid up. Now, it's my opinion you ain't goin' to be so hard on us as that; you will let us have it up to comfort our hearts on this fine night, won't you?"

The steward, whose green visage showed that he was too ill to enter into a dispute at that time, turned on his heel and walked aft, remarking that they might eat the bottom out o' the ship, for all he cared.

"There now, you misbemannered Patlander, go and get it, or we'll throw you overboard," cried Scroggles, twisting his long limbs awkwardly as he shifted his position on the windla.s.s.

"Now, then, shipmates, don't go for to ax it," said Briant, remaining immovable. "Don't I know wot's best for ye? Let me spaake to ye now.

Did any of ye iver study midsin?"

"No!" cried several with a laugh.

"Sure I thought not," continued Phil, with a patronising air, "or ye'd niver ask for the bread--kid out o' saisin. Now I was in the medical way meself wance--ay, ye may laugh, but it's thrue--I wos 'prentice to a 'pothecary, an' I've mixed up more midsins than would pisen the whole popilation of owld Ireland--barrin' the praists, av coorse. And didn't I hear the conva.r.s.e o' all the doctors in the place? And wasn't the word always--`Be rigglar with yer mails--don't ait, avic, more nor three times a day, and not too much, now. Be sparin'.'"

"Hah! ye long-winded grampus," interrupted d.i.c.k Barnes, impatiently.

"An' warn't the doctors right? Three times a day for sick folk, and six times--or more--for them wot's well."

"Hear, hear!" cried the others, while two of them seized Briant by the neck, and thrust him forcibly towards the after-hatch. "Bring up the kid, now; an' if ye come without it, look out for squalls."

"Och! worse luck," sighed the misused a.s.sistant, as he disappeared.

In a few minutes Phil returned with the kid, which was a species of tray filled with broken sea-biscuit, which, when afloat, goes by the name of "bread."

This was eagerly seized, for the appet.i.tes of sailors are always sharp, except immediately after meals. A quant.i.ty of the broken biscuit was put into a strainer, and fried in whale-oil, and the men sat round the kid to enjoy their luxurious feast, and relate their adventures--all of which were more or less marvellous, and many of them undoubtedly true.

The more one travels in this world of ours, and the more one reads of the adventures of travellers upon whose narratives we can place implicit confidence, the more we find that men do not now require, as they did of old, to draw upon their imaginations for marvellous tales of wild, romantic adventure, in days gone by, travellers were few; foreign lands were almost unknown. Not many books were written; and of the few that were, very few were believed. In the present day men of undoubted truthfulness have roamed far and wide over the whole world, their books are numbered by hundreds, and much that was related by ancient travellers, but not believed, has now been fully corroborated. More than that, it is now known that men have every where received, as true, statements which modern discovery has proved to be false, and on the other hand they have often refused to believe what is now ascertained to be literally true.

We would suggest, in pa.s.sing, that a lesson might be learned from this fact--namely, that we ought to receive a statement in regard to a foreign land, not according to the probability or the improbability of the statement itself, but according to the credibility of him who makes it. Ailie Dunning had a trustful disposition; she acted on neither of the above principles. She believed all she heard, poor thing, and therefore had a head pretty well stored with mingled fact and nonsense.

While the men were engaged with their meal, Dr Hopley came on deck and found her leaning over the stern, looking down at the waves which shone with sparkling phosph.o.r.escent light. An almost imperceptible breeze had sprung up, and the way made by the vessel as she pa.s.sed through the water was indicated by a stream of what appeared lambent blue flame.

"Looking at the fish, Ailie, as usual?" said the doctor as he came up.

"What are they saying to you to-night?"