When Jack Easy had gained the deck, he found the sun shining gaily, a
soft air blowing from the shore, and the whole of the rigging and every
part of the ship loaded with the shirts, trousers, and jackets of the
seamen, which had been wetted during the heavy gale, and were now
hanging up to dry; all the wet sails were also spread on the booms or
triced up in the rigging, and the ship was slowly forging through the
blue water. The captain and first lieutenant were standing on the
gangway in converse, and the majority of the officers were with their
quadrants and sextants ascertaining the latitude at noon. The decks
were white and clean, the sweepers had just laid by their brooms, and
the men were busy coiling down the ropes. It was a scene of
cheerfulness, activity, and order, which lightened his heart after the
four days of suffering, close air, and confinement, from which he had
just emerged.
The captain, who perceived him, beckoned to him, asked him kindly how he
felt: the first lieutenant also smiled upon him, and many of the
officers, as well as his messmates, congratulated him upon his recovery.
The captain's steward came up to him, touched his hat, and requested the
pleasure of his company to dinner in the cabin. Jack was the essence of
politeness, took off his hat, and accepted the invitation. Jack was
standing on a rope which a seaman was coiling down; the man touched his
hat and requested he would be so kind as to take his foot off. Jack
took his hat off his head in return, and his foot off the rope. The
master touched his hat, and reported twelve o'clock to the first
lieutenant--the first lieutenant touched his hat, and reported twelve
o'clock to the captain--the captain touched his hat, and told the first
lieutenant to make it so. The officer of the watch touched his hat, and
asked the captain whether they should pipe to dinner--the captain
touched his hat and said, "If you please."
The midshipman received his orders, and touched his hat, which he gave
to the head boatswain's mate, who touched his hat, and then the calls
whistled cheerily.
"Well," thought Jack, "politeness seems to be the order of the day, and
every one has an equal respect for the other." Jack stayed on deck; he
peeped through the ports, which were open, and looked down into the deep
blue wave; he cast his eyes aloft, and watched the tall spars sweeping
and tracing with their points, as it were, a small portion of the clear
sky, as they acted in obedience to the motion of the vessel; he looked
forward at the range of carronades which lined the sides of the deck,
and then he proceeded to climb one of the carronades, and lean over the
hammocks to gaze on the distant land.
"Young gentleman, get off those hammocks," cried the master, who was
officer of the watch, in a surly tone.
Jack looked round.
"Do you hear me, sir? I'm speaking to you," said the master again.
Jack felt very indignant, and he thought that politeness was not quite
so general as he supposed.
It happened that Captain Wilson was upon deck.
"Come here, Mr Easy," said the captain; "it is a rule in the service,
that no one gets on the hammocks, unless in case of emergency--I never
do--nor the first lieutenant--nor any of the officers or men--therefore,
upon the principle of equality, you must not do it either."
"Cerainly not, sir," replied Jack, "but still I do not see why that
officer in the shining hat should be so angry, and not speak to me as if
I were a gentleman, as well as himself."
"I have already explained that to you, Mr Easy."
"Oh, yes, I recollect now, it's zeal; but this zeal appears to me to be
the only unpleasant thing in the service. It's a pity, as you said,
that the service cannot do without it."
Captain Wilson laughed, and walked away; and shortly afterwards, as he
turned up and down the deck with the master, he hinted to him that he
should not speak so sharply to a lad who had committed such a trifling
error through ignorance. Now Mr Smallsole, the master, who was a surly
sort of a personage, and did not like even a hint of disapprobation of
his conduct, although very regardless of the feeling of others,
determined to pay this off on Jack, the very first convenient
opportunity. Jack dined in the cabin, and was very much pleased to find
that every one drank wine with him, and that everybody at the captain's
table appeared to be on an equality. Before the dessert had been on the
table five minutes, Jack became loquacious on his favourite topic; all
the company stared with surprise at such an unheard-of doctrine being
broached on board of a man-of-war; the captain argued the point, so as
to controvert, without too much offending, Jack's notions, laughing the
whole time that the conversation was carried on.
It will be observed, that this day may be considered as the first in
which Jack really made his appearance on board, and it also was on this
first day that Jack made known, at the captain's table, his very
peculiar notions. If the company at the captain's table, which
consisted of the second lieutenant, purser, Mr Jolliffe, and one of the
midshipmen, were astonished at such heterodox opinions being started in
the presence of the captain, they were equally astonished at the cool,
good-humoured ridicule with which they were received by Captain Wilson.
The report of Jack's boldness, and every word and opinion that he had
uttered (of course much magnified) was cirulated that evening through
the whole ship; it was canvassed in the gun-room by the officers, it was
descanted upon by the midshipmen as they walked the deck; the captain's
steward held a levee abreast of the ship's funnel, in which he narrated
this new doctrine. The sergeant of marines gave his opinion in his
berth that it was damnable. The boatswain talked over the matter with
the other warrant officers, till the grog was all gone, and then
dismissed it as too dry a subject: and it was the general opinion of the
ship's company, that as soon as they arrived at Gibraltar Bay, our hero
would bid adieu to the service, either by being sentenced to death by a
court-martial, or by being dismissed, and towed on shore on a grating.
Others, who had more of the wisdom of the serpent, and who had been
informed by Mr Sawbridge that our hero was a lad who would inherit a
large property, argued differently, and considered that Captain Wilson
had very good reason for being so lenient--and among them was the second
lieutenant. There were but four who were well inclined towards Jack--to
wit, the captain, the first lieutenant, Mr Jolliffe, the one-eyed
master's mate, and Mephistopheles, the black, who, having heard that
Jack had uttered such sentiments, loved him with all his heart and soul.
We have referred to the second lieutenant, Mr Asper. This young man
had a very high respect for birth, and particularly for money, of which
he had very little. He was the son of an eminent merchant who, during
the time that he was a midshipman, had allowed him a much larger sum for
his expenses than was necessary or proper; and, during his career, he
found that his full pocket procured him consequence, not only among his
own messmates, but also with many of the officers of the ships that he
sailed in. A man who is able and willing to pay a large tavern bill
will always find followers--that is, to the tavern; and lieutenants did
not disdain to dine, walk arm in arm, and be "hail fellow well met" with
a midshipman, at whose expense they lived during the time they were on
shore. Mr Asper had just received his commission and appointment, when
his father became a bankrupt, and the fountain was dried up from which
he had drawn such liberal supplies. Since that, Mr Asper had felt that
his consequence was gone: he could no longer talk about the service
being a bore, or that he should give it up; he could no longer obtain
that deference paid to his purse, and not to himself; and he had
contracted very expensive habits, without having any longer the means of
gratifying them. It was therefore no wonder that he imbibed a great
respect for money; and, as he could no longer find the means himself, he
was glad to pick up anybody else at whose cost he could indulge in that
extravagance and expense to which he had been so long accustomed, and
still sighed for. Now, Mr Asper knew that our hero was well supplied
with money, as he had obtained from the waiter the amount of the bill
paid at the Fountain, and he had been waiting for Jack's appearance on
deck to become his very dearest and most intimate friend. The
conversation in the cabin made him feel assured that Jack would require
and be grateful for support, and he had taken the opportunity of a walk
with Mr Sawbridge, to offer to take Jack in his watch. Whether it was
that Mr Sawbridge saw through the design of Mr Asper, or whether he
imagined that our hero would be better pleased with him than with the
master, considering his harshness of deportment; or with himself, who
could not, as first lieutenant, overlook any remission of duty, the
offer was accepted, and Jack Easy was ordered, as he now entered upon
his duties, to keep watch under Lieutenant Asper.
But not only was this the first day that Jack may be said to have
appeared in the service, but it was the first day in which he had
entered the midshipman's berth, and was made acquainted with his
messmates.
We have already mentioned Mr Jolliffe, the master's mate, but we must
introduce him more particularly. Nature is sometimes extremely
arbitrary, and never did she show herself more so than in insisting that
Mr Jolliffe should have the most sinister expression of countenance
that ever had been looked upon.
He had suffered martyrdom with the small-pox, which probably had
contracted his lineaments: his face was not only deeply pitted, but
scarred, with this cruel disorder. One eye had been lost, and all
eyebrows had disappeared--and the contrast between the dull, sightless
opaque orb on one side of his face, and the brilliant, piercing little
ball on the other, was almost terrifying. His nose had been eaten away
by the disease till it formed a sharp but irregular point: part of the
muscles of the chin were contracted, and it was drawn in with unnatural
seams and puckers. He was tall, gaunt, and thin, seldom smiled, and
when he did, the smile produced a still further distortion.
Mr Jolliffe was the son of a warrant officer. He did not contract this
disease until he had been sent out to the West Indies, where it swept
away hundreds. He had now been long in the service, with little or no
chance of promotion. He had suffered from indigence, from reflections
upon his humble birth, from sarcasms on his appearance. Every contumely
had been heaped upon him at one time or another, in the ships in which
he served; among a crowd he had found himself desolate--and now,
although no one dared treat him to his face with disrespect, he was only
respected in the service from a knowledge of his utility and exemplary
performance of his duties--he had no friends or even companions. For
many years he had retired within himself, he had improved by reading and
study, had felt all the philanthropy of a Christian, and extended it
towards others. Silent and reserved, he seldom spoke in the berth,
unless his authority, as caterer, was called for; all respected Mr
Jolliffe, but no one liked, as a companion, one at whose appearance the
very dogs would bark. At the same time every one acknowledged his
correct behaviour in every point, his sense of justice, his forbearance,
his kindness, and his good sense. With him life was indeed a
pilgrimage, and he wended his way in all Christian charity and all
Christian zeal.
In all societies, however small they may be, provided that they do but
amount to half a dozen, you will invariably meet with a bully. And it
is also generally the case that you will find one of that society who is
more or less the butt. You will discover this even in occasional
meetings, such as a dinner-party, the major part of which have never met
before.
Previous to the removal of the cloth, the bully will have shown himself
by his dictatorial manner, and will also have selected the one upon whom
he imagines that he can best practise. In a midshipman's berth this
fact has become almost proverbial, although now perhaps it is not
attended with that disagreeable despotism which was permitted at the
time that our hero entered the service.
The bully of the midshipman's berth of H.M. sloop _Harpy_ was a young
man about seventeen, with light, curly hair, and florid countenance, the
son of the clerk in the dockyard at Plymouth, and his name was Vigors.
The butt was a pudding-face Tartar-physiognomied boy of fifteen, whose
intellects, with fostering, if not great, might at least have been
respectable, had he not lost all confidence in his own powers from the
constant jeers and mockeries of those who had a greater fluency of
speech without perhaps so much real power of mind. Although slow, what
he learned he invariably retained. This lad's name was Gossett. His
father was a wealthy yeoman of Lynn, in Norfolk. There were at the time
but three other midshipmen in the ship, of whom it can only be said that
they were like midshipmen in general, with little appetite for learning,
but good appetites for dinner, hating everything like work, fond of
everything like fun, fighting _a l'outrance_ one minute, and sworn
friends the next--with general principles of honour and justice, but
which were occasionally warped according to circumstances; with all the
virtues and vices so heterogeneously jumbled and heaped together, that
it was almost impossible to ascribe any action to its true motive, and
to ascertain to what point their vice was softened down into almost a
virtue, and their virtues from mere excess degenerated into vice. Their
names were O'Connor, Mills, and Gascoigne. The other shipmates of our
hero it will be better to introduce as they appear on the stage.
After Jack had dined in the cabin he followed his messmates Jolliffe and
Gascoigne down into the midshipmen's berth.
"I say, Easy," observed Gascoigne, "you are a devilish free and easy
sort of a fellow, to tell the captain that you considered yourself as
great a man as he was."
"I beg your pardon," replied Jack, "I did not argue individually, but
generally, upon the principles of the rights of man."
"Well," replied Gascoigne, "it's the first time I ever heard a middy do
such a bold thing; take care your rights of man don't get you in the
wrong box--there's no arguing on board of a man-of-war. The captain
took it amazingly easy, but you'd better not broach that subject too
often."
"Gascoigne gives you very good advice, Mr Easy," observed Jolliffe;
"allowing that your ideas are correct, which it appears to me they are
not, or at least impossible to be acted upon, there is such a thing as
prudence, and however much this question may be canvassed on shore, in
his Majesty's service it is not only dangerous in itself, but will be
very prejudicial to you."
"Man is a free agent," replied Easy.
"I'll be shot if a midshipman is," replied Gascoigne, laughing, "and
that you'll soon find."
"And yet it was the expectation of finding that equality that I was
induced to come to sea."
"On the first of April, I presume," replied Gascoigne. "But are you
really serious?"
Hereupon Jack entered into a long argument, to which Jolliffe and
Gascoigne listened without interruption, and Mesty with admiration: at
the end of it, Gascoigne laughed heartily and Jolliffe sighed.
"From whence did you learn all this?" inquired Jolliffe.
"From my father, who is a great philosopher, and has constantly upheld
these opinions."
"And did your father wish you to go to sea?"
"No, he was opposed to it," replied Jack, "but of course he could not
combat my rights and free-will."
"Mr Easy, as a friend," replied Jolliffe, "I request that you would as
much as possible keep your opinions to yourself: I shall have an
opportunity of talking to you on the subject, and will then explain to
you my reasons."
As soon as Mr Jolliffe had ceased, down came Mr Vigors and O'Connor,
who had heard the news of Jack's heresy.
"You do not know Mr Vigors and Mr O'Connor," said Jolliffe to Easy.
Jack, who was the essence of politeness, rose and bowed, at which the
others took their seats, without returning the salutation. Vigors had,
from what he had heard and now seen of Easy, thought he had somebody
else to play upon, and without ceremony he commenced.
"So, my chap, you are come on board to raise a mutiny here with your
equality--you came off scot free at the captain's table; but it won't
do, I can tell you, even in the midshipman's berth some must knock
under, and you are one of them."
"If, sir," replied Easy, "you mean by knock under, that I must submit, I
can assure you that you are mistaken. Upon the same principle that I
would never play the tyrant to those weaker than myself, so will I
resent oppression if attempted."
"Damme, but he's a regular sea lawyer already: however, my boy, we'll
soon put your mettle to the proof."
"Am I then to infer that I am not on an equality with my messmates?"
replied Jack, looking at Jolliffe. The latter was about to answer him,
but Vigors interrupted.
"Yes, you are on an equality as far as this--that you have an equal
right to the berth, if you are not knocked out of it for insolence to
your masters; that you have an equal share to pay for the things
purchased for the mess, and an equal right to have your share, provided
you can get it; you have an equal right to talk, provided you are not
told to hold your tongue. The fact is, you have an equal right with
every one else to do as you can, get what you can, and say what you can,
always provided that you can do it; for here the weakest goes to the
wall, and that is midshipmen's berth equality. Now, do you understand
all that; or will you wait for a practical illustration?"
"I am then to infer that the equality here is as much destroyed as it
even will be among savages, where the strong oppress the weak, and the
only law is club law--in fact, much the same as it is at a public or
large school on shore?"
"I suspect you are right for once. You were at a public school: how did
they treat you there?"
"As you propose treating people here--`the weakest went to the wall.'"
"Well, then, a nod's as good as a wink to a blind horse, that's all, my
hearty," said Vigors.
But the hands being turned up, "Shorten sail" put an end to the
altercation for the present.
As our hero had not yet received orders to go to his duty, he remained
below with Mesty.
"By de powers, Massa Easy, but I lub you with my hole soul," said Mesty.
"By Jasus, you really tark fine, Massa Easy; dat Mr Vigor--nebber care
for him, wouldn't you lik him--and sure you would," continued the black,
feeling the muscle of Jack's arm. "By the soul of my fader, I'd bet my
week's allowance on you anyhow. Nebber be 'fraid, Massa Easy."
"I am not afraid," replied Jack; "I've thrashed bigger fellows than he;"
and Jack's assertion was true. Mr Bonnycastle never interfered in a
fair fight, and took no notice of black eyes, provided the lessons were
well said. Jack had fought and fought again, until he was a very good
bruiser, and although not so tall as Vigors, he was much better built
for fighting. A knowing Westminster boy would have bet his half-crown
upon Jack, had he seen him and his anticipated adversary.
The constant battles which Jack was obliged to fight at school had been
brought forward by Jack against his father's arguments in favour of
equality, but they had been overruled by Mr Easy's pointing out that
the combats of _boys_ had nothing to do with the rights of man.
As soon as the watch was called, Vigors, O'Connor, Gossett, and
Gascoigne, came down from the berth. Vigors, who was strongest in the
berth, except Jolliffe, had successively had his superiority
acknowledged, and, when on deck, he had talked of Easy's impertinence,
and his intention of bringing him to his senses. The others, therefore,
came down to see the fun.
"Well, Mr Easy," observed Vigors, as he came into the berth, "you take
after your name, at all events; I suppose you intend to eat the king's
provision, and do nothing."
Jack's mettle was already up.
"You will oblige me, sir, by minding your own business," replied Jack.
"You impudent blackguard, if you say another word I'll give you a good
thrashing, and knock some of your equality out of you."
"Indeed," replied Jack, who almost fancied himself back at Mr
Bonnycastle's; "we'll try that."
Whereupon Jack very coolly divested himself of his upper garments,
neckerchief, and shirt, much to the surprise of Mr Vigors, who little
contemplated such a proof of decision and confidence, and still more to
the delight of the other midshipmen, who would have forfeited a week's
allowance to see Vigors well thrashed. Vigors, however, knew that he
had gone too far to retreat; he therefore prepared for action; and, when
ready, the whole party went out into the steerage to settle the
business.
Vigors had gained his assumed authority more by bullying than fighting;
others had submitted to him without a sufficient trial; Jack, on the
contrary, had won his way up in school by hard and scientific combat:
the result, therefore, may easily be imagined. In less than a quarter
of an hour Vigors, beaten dead, with his eyes closed, and three teeth
out, gave in; while Jack, after a basin of water, looked as fresh as
ever, with the exception of a few trifling scratches.
The news of this victory was soon through the ship; and before Jack had
resumed his clothes, it had been told confidentially by Sawbridge to the
captain.
"So soon!" said Captain Wilson, laughing; "I expected that a
midshipman's berth would do wonders; but I did not expect this, yet
awhile. This victory is the first severe blow to Mr Easy's equality,
and will be more valuable than twenty defeats. Let him now go to his
duty: he will soon find his level."