Given under our hand and seal,
BENJAMIN LANGHAM, Sub-lieutenant.
A. E. HAMILTON, Engineer Sub-lieut.
HARRY G. WEBSTER, Senior Midshipman.
Of course it was silly rot. Still, so much silly rot goes on in a
gunroom, and a lot of it makes a difference—actually, and nothing they
could have done would have made Dicky more pleased. He still spent most
of the day in his hammock, but was allowed "up" for two hours every
afternoon in the gunroom.
He told Jim, on the quiet, that he quite liked going there now. He had
hated doing so before, and used to sit for hours on his chest outside,
or wander about on deck, because he so dreaded having his leg pulled,
and hearing himself called "Dear Little Dicky".
He could remember very little about the fight with the junks, and
nothing at all after seeing all those Chinamen struggling in the water
when that first junk sank. He didn’t even remember Sharpe and me giving
him that hot milk during the night, and nothing till he was carried up
the side of the _Ringdove_.
You may bet that Jim and I had plenty to tell him; and we brought Sharpe
along to back us up, because I couldn’t get him to believe, by myself,
that it was his Maxim gun which had done the trick when the first of the
four junks came along.
"I didn’t fire it myself, though, Sharpe, did I?" he asked; and Sharpe
said, "No, sir, you didn’t hardly do that, but you was a-steadyin’ of
the cartridge belt, and seeing as how it was ’fed’ properly, and
a-knocking back the crank handle, and you was shoutin’ and cheerin’ like
Billy Loo, that you was, sir. You was about the only one of us who
wasn’t skeared, or—well—if you was, you didn’t look skeared," he went
on, for he saw that Dicky wouldn’t believe him.
"We was all a bit skeared, eh, sir?" and he winked his eye at me.