young Cockney, who had the most miraculous faculty of telling lies--not
only palpable lies, but lies absolutely impossible: yet they were so
sublimely told often, and he contrived to lug into them such a quantity
of gorgeous tinsel ornament, as, in his happier efforts, decidedly to
carry the day against his opponent. The London hand had seen _life_ too,
of which, with respect to what is called the world, his competitor was
as ignorant as a child. He had his sentimental vein, accordingly, in
which he took the last love-tale out of some "Penny Story-Teller" or
fashionable novel he had spelled over below, and turned it over into a
parody that would have thrown its unfortunate author into convulsions of
horror, and his critics into shrieks of laughter. The fine language of
lords and ladies, of romantic heroines, or of foreign counts and
bandits, was gravely retailed and gravely listened to by a throng of
admiring jacktars; while the old whaler smoked his pipe sulkily apart,
gave now and then a scornful glance out of his weather-eye, and called
it "all '_high-dic_' and soger's gammon."
On this occasion, however, the group forward did not solicit the
services of either candidate, as they happened to have present among
them a shipmate, who, by general confession, "took the shine" out of
both, although it was rarely they could get hold of him. "Old Jack," the
captain's private steward, was the oldest seaman on board, and having
known the captain when the latter went to sea, had sailed with him
almost ever since he commanded a ship, as well as lived in his house on
shore. He did not now keep his watch, nor take his "trick at the helm,"
except when he chose, and was altogether a privileged sort of a person,
or one of the "idlers." His name was Jacobs, which afforded a pretext
for calling him "Old Jack," with the sailor's fondness for that
Christian cognomen, which it is difficult to account for, unless because
Jonah and St. John were seafaring characters, and the Roman Catholic
holy clerk St. Nicholas was baptized "Davy Jones," with sundry other
reasons good at sea. But Old Jack was, at any rate, the best hand for a
yarn in the Gloucester Indiaman, and had been once or twice called upon
to spin one to the ladies and gentlemen in the cuddy. It was partly
because of his inexhaustible fund of good humor, and partly from that
love of the sea which looked out through all that the old tar had seen
and undergone, and which made him still follow the bowsprit, although
able to live comfortably ashore. In his blue jacket, white canvas
trowsers edged with blue, and glazed hat, coming forward to the galley
to light his pipe, after serving the captain's tea of an evening, Old
Jack looked out over the bulwarks, sniffed the sharp sea-air, and stood
with his shirt-sleeve fluttering as he put his finger in his pipe, the
very embodiment of the scene--the model of a prime old salt who had
ceased to "rough it," but could do so yet if needful.
"Come, old ship!" said the men near the windlass, as soon as Old Jack
came forward, "give us a yarn, will ye?"
"Yarn!" said Jack, smiling, "what yarn, mates? 'Tis a fine night,
though, for that same--the clouds fly high, and she's balling off a good
ten knots sin' eight bells."
"That she is, bo'--so give us a yarn now, like a reg'lar old A 1 as you
are!" said one.
"'Vast there, mate," said a man-o'-wars-man, winking to the
rest,--"you're always a-cargo-puddling, Bill! D'ye think Old Jack
answers to any other hail nor the Queen's? I say, old three-decker in
or'nary, we all wants one o' your close-laid yarns this good night.
Whaling Jim here rubs his down with a thought over much o' the tar, an'
young Joe dips 'em in yallow varnish--so if you says Nay, why, we'll all
save our grog, and get drunk as soon as may be."
"Well, well, mates," said Jack, endeavoring to conceal his flattered,
feelings, "what is it to be, though?"
"Let's see," said the man-o'-war's-man--"aye, give us the Green Hand!"
"Aye, aye, the Green Hand!" exclaimed one and all. This "Green Hand" was
a story Old Jack had already related several times, but always with such
amusing variations, that it seemed on each repetition a new one--the
listeners testifying their satisfaction by growls of rough laughter, and
by the emphatic way in which, during a pause, they squirted their
tobacco-juice on the deck. What gave additional zest to this particular
yarn, too, was the fact of its hero being no less than the captain
himself, who was at this moment on the poop quarter-deck of the ship,
pointing out something to a group of ladies by the round-house--a tall,
handsome-looking man of about forty, with all the mingled gravity and
frank good humor of a sailor in his firm, weather-tinted countenance. To
have the power of secretly contrasting his present condition and manners
with those delineated by Old Jack's episode from the "skipper's"
previous biography, was the _acme_ of comic delight to these rude sons
of Neptune, and the narrator just hit this point.
"Ye see," began he, "tis about six an' twenty years gone since I was an
able seaman before the mast, in a small Indyman they called the Chester
Castle, lying at that time behind the Isle of Dogs, in sight of Grenidge
Hospital. She was full laden, but there was a strong breeze blowing up
that wouldn't let us get under weigh; and, besides, we waited for the
most part of our hands. I had sailed with the same ship two voyages
before; so," says the captain to me one day, "Jacobs, there's a lady over
at Greenwich yonder wants to send her boy to sea in the ship--for a
sickening I s'pose. I am a going up to town myself," says he, "so take
the quarter-boat and two of the boys and go ashore with this letter, and
see the young fool. From what I've heard," says the skipper, "he's a
jackanapes as will give us more trouble than thanks. However, if you
find the lady's bent on it, why, she may send him aboard to-morrow if
she likes. Only we don't carry no young gentlemen; and if he slings his
hammock here, you must lick him into shape. I'll make a sailor of him or
a cabin-boy." "Ay, ay, sir," says I, shoving the letter into my hat; so
in half an hour's time I knocks at the door of the lady's house, rigged
out in my best, and hands over the screed to a fat fellow with red
breeches and yallow swabs on his shoulders, like a captain of marines,
that looked frightened at my hail, for I thou't he'd been deaf by the
long spell he took before he opened the door. In five minutes I heard a
woman's voice ask at the footman if there was a sailor awaiting below.
"Yes, marm," says he; and "show him up," says she. Well, I gives a
scrape with my larboard foot, and a tug to my hair, when I gets to the
door of _such_ a fine room above decks, all full o' tables, an' chairs,
an' sofers, an' piangers, an' them sort o' highflying consarns. There
was a lady all in silks and satins on one of the sofers, dressed out
like a widow, with a pretty little girl as was playing music out of a
large book--and a picter of a man upon the wall, which I at once logged
it down for him she'd parted company from. "Sarvint, ma'am," says I.
"Come in, my good man," says the lady. "You're a sailor?" says
she--asking, like, to be sure if I warn't the cook's mate in dish-guise,
I fancy. "Well, marm," I raps out, "I make bould to say as I hopes I
am!"--an' I catches a sight o' myself in a big looking-glass behind the
lady, as large as our sky-sail,--and, being a young fellow in them days,
thinks I, "Blow me, if Betsy Brown asked me that now, I'd ask her if
_she_ was a _woman_!" "Well," says she, "Captain Steel tells me in this
here letter, he's agoing to take my son." Now," says she, "I'm sore
against it--couldn't you say some'at to turn his mind?" "The best way
for that, yer ladyship," says I, "is to let him go, if it was only the
length of the Nore. The sea'll turn his stomack for him, marm," I says,
"an' then we can send him home by a pilot." "He wanted for to go into
the navy," says the lady again, "but I couldn't think on that for a
moment, on account of this fearful war; an', after all, he'll be safer
in sailing at sea nor in the army or navy--don't you think so, my good
man?" "It's all you knows about it," thinks I; hows'ever, I said there
wasn't a doubt on it. "Is Captain Steel a rash man?" says she. "How so,
marm?" says I, some'at taken aback. "I hope he does not sail at night,
or in storms, like too many of his profession, I'm afeard," says she; "I
hope he always weighs the anchor in such cases, very careful." "Oh, in
course," says I, not knowin', for the life of me, what she meant. I
didn't like to come the rig over the poor lady, seein' her so anxious
like; but it was no use, we was on such different tacks, ye see. "O yes,
marm," I says, "Captain Steel al'ays reefs taups'ls at sight of a squall
brewing to wind'rd; and we're as safe as a church, then, ye know, with a
man at the wheel as knows his duty." "This relieves my mind," the lady
says, "very much; but I couldn't think why she kept sniffing all the
time at her smelling bottle, as she wor agoin to faint. "Don't take it
to heart so, yer ladyship," I says at last; "I'll look after the young
gentleman till he finds his sea-legs." "Thank you," says she; "but, I
beg your pardon, would you be kind enough for to open the winder, and
look out if you see Edward? I think he's in the garding. I feel sich a
smell of pitch and tar!" I hears her say to the girl; and says she to me
again, "Do you see Edward there?--call to him, please." Accordingly, I
couldn't miss sight of three or four young slips alongside, for they
made plenty of noise--one of 'em on top of a water-barrel smoking a
cigar; another singing out inside of it for mercy; and the rest roaring
round about it, like so many Bedlamites. "No wonder the young scamp
wants to go to sea," thinks I, "he's got nothin' arthly to do but
mischief." "Which is the young gentleman, marm?" says I, lookin' back
into the room--"Is it him with the cigar and the red skull-cap?" "Yes,"
says the lady--"call him up, please." "Hallo!" I sings out, and all runs
off but him on the barrel, and "Hallo!" says he. "You're wanted on deck,
sir," I says; and in five minutes in comes my young gemman, as grave as
you please. "Edward," says the mother, "this is one of Captain Steel's
men." "Is he going to take me?" says the young fellow, with his hands in
his pockets. "Well, sir," I says, "'tis a very bad look-out, is the sea,
for them as don't like it. You'll be sorry ten times over you've left
sich a berth as this here afore you're down Channel." The young chap
looks me all over from clue to earing, and says he, "My mother told you
to say that!" "No sir," says I, "I says it on my own hook." "Why did you
go yourself then?" says he. "I couldn't help it," answers I. "Oh," says
the impertinent little devil, "but you're only one of the common
sailors, ain't you?" "Split me, you little beggar?" thinks I, "if I
doesn't show you the odds betwixt a common sailor, as ye call it, and a
lubber of a boy, before long!" But I wasn't goin' to let him take the
jaw out o' me, so I only laughed, an' says I, "Why, I'm captain of the
foretop at sea, any how." "Where's your huniform, then?" says the boy,
lowering his tone a bit. "O," I says, "we doesn't al'ays wear huniform,
ye know, sir. This here's what we call on-dress." "I'm sorry, sir," says
the lady, "I didn't ax you to sit down." "No offence at all, marm," I
says, but I took a couple o' glasses of brandy as was brought in. I saw
'twas no use goin' against the young chap; so, when he asked what he'd
have to do aboard, I told him nothing to speak of, except count the
sails now and then, look over the bows to see how the ship went, and go
aloft with a spy-glass. "Oh," says his mother, at this, "I hope Captain
Steel won't never allow Edward to go up those dangerous ladders! It is
my partic'lar request he should be punished if he does." "Sartainly,
marm, I'll mention it to the captain," I says, "an' no doubt he'll give
them orders as you speak on." "The captain desired me to say the young
gentleman could come aboard as soon as he likes," says I, before goin'
out of the door. "Very well, sir," says the lady, "I shall see the
tailor this same afternoon, and get his clothes, if so be it must." The
last word I said was, putting my head half in again to tell 'em, "There
was no use gettin' any huniforms at present, seein' the ship's
sail-maker could do all as was wanted afterwards, when we got to sea."
Well, two or three days after, the captain sent word to say the ship
would drop down with the morning tide, and Master Collins had better be
aboard by six o'clock. I went ashore with the boat, but the young
gemman's clothes warn't ready yet; so it was made up he was to come
aboard from Gravesend the day after. But his mother and an old lady, a
friend of theirs, would have it they'd go and see his bed-room, and take
a look at the ship. There was a bit of breeze with the tide, and the old
Indiaman bobbed up and down on it in the cold morning; you could hear
the wash of water poppling on to her rudder, with her running gear blown
out in a bend; and Missus Collins thought they'd never get up the dirty
black sides of the vessel, as she called 'em. The other said her husband
had been a captain, an' she laid claim to a snatch of knowledge.
"Sailor," says she to me, as we got under the quarter, "that there tall
mast is the main-bowsprit, ain't it? and that other is the gallant
bowling you call it, don't you?" says she. "No doubt, marm," says I,
winking to the boys not to laugh. "It's all right," I says. Howsoever,
as to the bed-room, the captain showed 'em over the cabin, and put 'em
off by saying the ship was so out of order he couldn't say which rooms
was to be which yet, though they needn't fear Master Ned would get all
comfortable; so ashore the poor woman went, pretty well pleased,
considerin' her heart was against the whole consarn.
Well, the next afternoon, lying off Gravesend, out comes a wherry with
young master. One of the men said there was a midshipman in it.
"Midshipman be blowed!" says I; "did ye ever see a reefer in a wherry,
or sitting out 'o the starn-sheets? It's neither more nor less nor the
greenhorn we've got." "Why don't the bo'sun pipe to man sideropes for
him!" says th' other; "but, my eye, Bob," says he to me; "what a sight
of traps the chap's got in the boat! 'twill be enough to heel the
Chester Castle to the side he berths upon, on an even keel. Do he mean
to have the captain's cabin, I wonder!" Up the side he scrambles, with
the help of a side-ladder, all togged out to the nines in a span-new
blue jacket and anchor buttons, a cap with a gould band, and white ducks
made to fit--as jemmy-jessamy a looking fellow as you'd see of a cruise
along London parks, with the waterman singing out alongside to send down
a tackle for the dunnage, which it took a pair of purchase-blocks to
hoist them out on board. "What's all this?" says the mate, coming
for'ard from the quarter-deck. "'Tis the young gemman's traps, sir," I
says. "What the devil!" says the mate, "d'ye think we've room to stow
all this lumber? Strike it down into the forehold, Jacobs--but get out a
blue shirt or two, and a Scotch cap for the young whelp first, if he
wants to save that smooth toggery of his for his mammy. You're as green
as cabbage, I'm feared, my lad!" says he. By this time the boy was
struck all of a heap, an' didn't know what to say when he saw the boat
pulling for shore, except he wanted to have a sight of his bed-room.
"Jacobs," says the mate, laughing like an old bear, "take him below, and
show him his bed-room, as he calls it!" So down we went to the
half-deck, where the carpenter, bo'sun, and three or four of the
'prentices, had their hammocks slung. There I left him to overhaul his
big donkey of a chest, which his mother had stowed it with clothes
enough for a lord ambassador, but not a blessed thing fit to use--I
wouldn't 'a given my bit of a black box for the whole on it, ten times
over. There was another chockful of gingerbread, pots o' presarves,
pickles, and bottles; and, thinks I, "The old lady didn't know what
_shares_ is at sea, I reckon. 'Twill all be gone for footing, my boy,
before you've seen blue water, or I'm a Dutchman."
In a short time we was up anchor, going down with a fast breeze for the
Nore; and we stood out to sea that night, havin' to join a convoy off
Spithead. My gentleman was turned in all standing, on top o' some sails
below; and next day he was as sick as a greenhorn could be, cleaning out
his land-ballast where he lay, nor I didn't see him till he'd got
better. 'Twas blowing a strong breeze, with light canvas all in aloft,
and a single reef in the tops'ls; but fine enough for the Channel,
except the rain--when what does I see but the "Green Hand" on the
weather quarter-deck, holding on by the belaying-pins, with a yumbrella
over his head. The men for'ard was all in a roar, but none of the
officers was on deck save the third mate, The mate goes up to him, and
looks in his face. "Why," says he, "you confounded long-shore picked-up
son of a green-grocer, what _are_ you after?" an' he takes the article a
slap with his larboard-flipper, as sent it flying to leeward like a puff
of smoke. "Keep off the quarter-deck, you lubber," says he, giving him a
wheel down into the lee-scuppers--"it's well the captain didn't catch
ye!" "Come aft here, some of ye," sings out the third mate again, "to
brace up the main yard; and you, ye lazy beggar, clap on this moment and
pull!" At this the greenhorn takes out a pair o' gloves, shoves his
fingers into 'em, and tails on to the rope behind. "Well, dammit!" says
the mate, "if I ever see the likes o' that! Jacobs, get a tarbucket and
dip his fists in it; larn him what his hands was made for! I never could
bear to see a fellow ashore with his flippers shoed like his feet; but
at sea, confound me, it would make a man green-sick over again!" If
you'd only seen how Master Collins looked when shoved his missy fingers
into the tar, and chucked the gloves o' board! The next moment he ups
fists and made slap at me, when in goes the brush in his mouth; the mate
gives him a kick astarn; the young chap went sprawling down into the
half-deck ladder, where the carpenter had his shavin'-glass rigged to
crop his chin--and there he gets another clip across the jaws from
Chips. "Now," says the mate, "the chap'll be liker a sailor to-morrow.
He's got some spunk in him, though, by the way he let drive at you, my
lad," says he: "that fellow 'll either catch the cat or spoil the
monkey. Look after him, Jacobs, my lad," says the third mate; "he's in
my watch, and the captain wants him to rough it out; so show him the
ropes, and let him taste an end now an' then. Ha! ha! ha!" says he
again, laughing, "'tis the first time I ever see a embreller loosed out
at sea, and but the second I've seen brought aboard even! He's the
greenest hand, sure enough, it's been my luck to come across! But green
they say's nigh to blue, so look out if I don't try to make a sailor of
the young spark!"
Well, for the next three or four days the poor fellow was knocked about
on all hands; he'd got to go aloft to the 'gallant cross-trees, and out
on the yard foot-ropes the next morning, before breakfast; and, coming
down, the men made him fast till he sent down the key of his
bottle-chest to pay his footing. If he closed his eyes a moment in the
watch, slash comes a bucket full o' Channel water over him; the third
mate would keep him two hours on end, larnin' to rig out a sternsail
boom, or grease a royal mast. He led a dog's life of it too, in the
half-deck: last come, in course, has al'ays to go and fill the bread
barge, scrub the planks, an' do all the dirty jobs. Them _owners'
'prentices_, sich as he had for messmates, is always worse to their own
kind by far nor the "_common sailors_," as the long-shore folks calls a
foremast-man. I couldn't help takin' pity on the poor lad, being the
only one as had seen the way of his up-bringing, and I felt a sort of a
charge of him like; so one night I had a quiet spell with him in the
watch, an' as soon as I fell to speak kind-ways, there I seed the water
stand i' the boy's eyes. "It's a good thing," says he, tryin' to gulp it
down--"it's a good thing mother don't see all this!" "Ho, ho," says I,
"my lad, 'tis all but another way of bein' sea-sick! You doesn't get the
land cleared out, and snuff the sea blue breeze nat'ral like, all at
once! Hows'ever, my lad," says I, "take my advice--bring your hammock
an' chest into the fok'sle; swap half your fine clothes for blue shirts
and canvas trowsers; turn-to ready and willing, an' do all that's asked
you--you'll soon find the differ 'twixt the men and a few petty officers
an' 'prentices half out their time. The men 'll soon make a sailor of
you: you'll soon see what a seaman is; you'll larn ten times the
knowledge; an', add to that, you'll not be browbeat and looked jealous
on!"
Well, next night, what does he do but follows what I said, and afore
long most of his troubles was over; nor there wasn't a willin'er nor a
readier hand aboard, and every man was glad to put Ned through anything
he'd got to do. The mates began to take note on him; and though the
'prentices never left off callin' him the Green Hand, before we rounded
the Cape he could take his wheel with the best of them, and clear away a
sternsail out of the top in handsome style. We were out ten months, and
Ned Collins stuck to the fork'sle throughout. When we got up the Thames,
he went ashore to see his mother in a check shirt, and canvas trowsers
made out of an old royal, with a tarpaulin hat I built for him myself.
He would have me to come the next day over to the house for a supper;
so, having took a kindness to the young chap, why, I couldn't say nay.
There I finds him in the midst of a lot o' soft-faced chaps and young
ladies, a spinning the wonderfullest yarns about the sea and the East
Ingees, makin' 'em swallow all sorts of horse-marines' nonsense, about
marmaids, sea-sarpents, and sich like. "Hallo, my hearty!" says he, as
soon as he saw me, "heave a-head here and come to an anchor in this here
blessed chair." "Young ladies," says he, "this is Bob Jacobs, as I told
you kissed a marmaid hisself. He's a wonderful hand, is Bob, for the
fair!" You may fancy how flabbergasted I was at this, though the young
scamp was as cool as you please, and wouldn't ha' needed much to make
him kiss 'em all round; but I was al'ays milk-an'-water along side of
women, if they topped at all above my rating. "Well," thinks I, "my lad,
I wouldn't ha' said five minutes agone there was anything of the green
about ye yet, but I see it will take another voy'ge to wash it all out."
For to my thinkin', mates, 'tis more of a land-lubber to come the rig
over a few poor creatures that never saw blue water, than not to know
the ropes you warn't told. "O Mister Jacobs!" says Missus Collins to me
that night, before I went off, "d'ye think Edward's tired of that ere
horridsome sea yet?" "Well, marm," I says, "I'm afeard not. But I'll
tell ye, marm," says I, "if you want's to make him cut the consarn, the
only thing ye can do is to get him bound apprentice to it. From what
I've seen of him, he's a lad that won't bear aught again his liberty;
an' I do believe, if he thought he couldn't get free, he'd run the next
day!" Well, after that, ye see, I didn't know what more turned up of it;
for I went myself round to Hull, and ships in a timber-craft for the
Baltic, just to see some'at new.