WITH MR. BEMERTON'S ASSISTANCE I TAKE REFUGE AMID A GALLANT COMPANY
OF SEA DOGS
Mr. Bemerton again stood my very good friend, for he had sent up
during the day a book which he thought would do something for my
thirst for character; and indeed it did. It was a recent volume of
the Navy Records Society--a full-blooded work entitled by its editor
_Recollections by James Anthony Gardner_, but by this same Gardner,
an officer in Nelson's day, _Naval Recollections in Shreds and
Patches, with Strange Reflections above and under Hatches_.
Being old enough to remember very vividly the shock that followed
after that other James Anthony's rending of the Cheyne Row veil, I
was not unwilling to get a new connotation for those two Christian
names. And certainly James Anthony Gardner is a find.
He was born in 1770, in what he thought the best of all
lands--Ireland; and he came home from the sea in 1802, but he did not
take his pen in hand until 1836, during which time his memory had
purged itself of inessentials. He wrote them not for the cold eye of
a publisher's reader but (like a gentleman) for his own family's
entertainment. The result is a narrative of extraordinary
directness, full of careless human qualities, naked and unashamed,
and some pretty exercises in objurgation, prefaced by the following
ingenious verses:--
"I know nothing of grammar;
At school they never could hammer
Or beat it into my head.
The bare word made me stammer,
And turn pale as if I were dead.
But here I may as well be telling,
I'm often damned out in my spelling.
And this is all the apology
I offer for my chronology
And biographical sketches
Of mighty men and lubberly wretches,
From seventeen hundred and seventy-seven,
Their rank, their titles, and their names all given."
The last line contains nothing more nor less than the truth, for
Gardner, although so many years had passed, and he had served in as
many as twelve vessels, as midshipman, master's mate, and lieutenant,
remembered every man, and when the time came for appraisement was all
ready with his summary. It is these summaries, so vivid and
searching and kindly and understanding, to which it interests me to
draw attention: for such things are new to me, and may be new to
others; by their vigour and candour they take their place with more
ambitious anthropological efforts.
For swift and vivid summary it would be hard to beat some of the
following entries in Gardner's book of memory:--
Charles Buchan, purser. Dead. A most worthy gentleman.
Jack Swanson, gunner. Dead. A very good man but had a very bad wife.
Thomas Floyd, third lieutenant. Dead. A dandy.
W. Colt, midshipman. Dead. A very good fellow. We used to call him
"Old Owl."
George Rule Bluet, midshipman. Dead. A good-natured fellow, with
good abilities, but drank hard. I recollect being of a party at
Gosport when Bluet wanted to make love to a young lady, but did not
know how to begin. At last he took out of his pocket a plan of the
_Edgar's_ hold, which he begged her to accept, and hoped she would
keep it for his sake.
Sol Saradine. Dead. A droll, wicked fellow.
How Stevenson and Henley would have rejoiced in this name! Sol
Saradine. It breathes piracy and lawlessness.
Ben Forester, captain of marines. Dead. As brave and generous a
soul as ever lived, but thoughtless and died unfortunate.
-- Cook, Carpenter. Dead. A good man; no dandy.
Edward Forster, midshipman. Dead. Herculean Irishman; a terror to
the dockyard maties.
Thomas Watson, midshipman. Dead. A glorious noisy fellow.
Is not that an epitaph indeed, one to be proud of? I wish I was a
glorious noisy fellow.
Joseph Loring, third lieutenant. Dead. A good sailor, very
passionate, and swore like the devil.
The Parson (I forget his name). Dead. Had no dislike to grog.
Edward Dowdall, gunner. Dead. Lethargic; always dozing in the
forecastle; a sleepy, good man.
John Sandford, midshipman. Dead. A member of the Hell-Fire Club; a
dandy, and a droll fellow.
Thomas James Skerret, midshipman. This fellow wanted to be a tyrant,
but was too great a fool.
Robert Manning, midshipman. Dead. Bob was a good fellow.
Henry Batt, midshipman. Dead. An old schoolfellow of mine. Harry
was passionately fond of grog, which made him an ungrateful return by
taking him out of this world before it was agreeable. Nicknamed
"Ram," "Cat," "Batt," and "Rammon the Butcher."
Alexander Proctor, surgeon's assistant. Proud as the devil.
Hugh Land, clerk. A clever little pedant.
William Nowel, second lieutenant. Dead. Gloomy and fiery, but a
good officer and gentleman.
John Irwin, fourth lieutenant. Dead. A very good fellow, always
smiling.
John Roskruge, master. Dead. A very good man, one that was better
acquainted with rope-yarns and bilge-water than with Homer or Virgil.
He said a man's ideas should go no further than the jib-boom end.
John Tursides, midshipman. A droll old guardo.
Henry Foularton, midshipman. Dead. Very religious, and remarkably
neat in his dress: but at last drank very hard, and died regretting
that a keg of gin (alongside of him) should see him out, which was
really the case.
Billy Culmer, mate. Dead. Everyone has heard of Billy.
Thomas H. Tidy, midshipman. Dead. Poor Tom.
John Nazer, mate. A very good and very ugly fellow.
Peter M'Kinnon, gunner. A good sailor, but used to damn his poor
eyes so.
I could go on indefinitely thus, calling forth from their graves
these hard-bitten sea dogs; but that is enough. It is literature in
its way, is it not?
Are there the same or kindred characters in the Navy to-day, one
wonders. Let us hope so. But as time goes on and sophistication
spreads, the outstanding eccentricities are apt to decrease; there is
a general planing down of the harder knots. Gardner's book, however,
is in the main narrative. It is only at the end of the chapters that
he prints these critical lists. Many of his old messmates come in
for more detailed description--Mr. Stack, for example. Mr. Stack was
"cursed surly and disagreeable, but I believe meant well.... When in
good temper (which was seldom) he would say 'my son' when he
addressed any of us; but generally 'I'll split your ear.'"
Mr. Stack had no richness; he was simply a testy officer; not like
Mr. Quinton, with whom grog agreed so happily (among other things,
"making his flesh firm") that he took twenty-six tumblers of good
Hollands and water a day. "I must in justice declare, however," adds
Gardner, "that Mr. Quinton was no drunkard; I never saw him disguised
with liquor." On the same ship, the _Orestes_, was Mr. Stevens.
When Sir Roger Curtis came to inspect the vessel Mr. Stevens was the
first to go aloft, and was heartily commended by Sir Roger for his
activity. "You're a fine fellow, Mr. Stevens," he called up, "a most
active officer, Mr. Stevens; you are a wonder, Mr. Stevens." But Sir
Roger spoke too soon, for Mr. Stevens was in reality a slacker, and
was the last left on the yard. Sir Roger soon put things right. "I
recall all my compliments, Mr. Stevens," he bawled; "you're a damned
lubber, Mr. Stevens; a blockhead, Mr. Stevens; come down, Mr.
Stevens."
Lieutenant Morgan deserves to be better known, for he accepted one of
man's little difficulties with fortitude and humour. One day a
midshipman named Millar joined the ship, and Morgan, giving him a
quick glance, sprang towards him and asked him to dine that evening.
Millar was bewildered, for he had never seen Morgan before, but he
accepted. When dinner was over Morgan declared that he was under a
great obligation to his guest, and should at all times be happy to
acknowledge it. Poor Millar was quite at a loss. "Well then," said
Morgan, "I'll tell you. It is this. I was considered the ugliest
son of a bitch in the fleet until you came on board, but you beat me
dead hollow; and surely you can't wonder at my being sensible of the
obligation." Millar took it well, and all was harmony. Three months
later, who should join the ship but MacBride. No sooner had he
stepped on board than Millar was sent for by his first lieutenant.
"Millar," he said, "you are a happy dog for being relieved so soon.
I was the ugliest son of a bitch in the whole fleet for fully a year
before you relieved me; and here are you relieved in only three
months, for there stands one"--pointing to MacBride--"that beggars
all description, and if they were to rake hell they could not find
his fellow." Then, going up to MacBride, he shook his hand and asked
him to dine that evening with himself and Millar, "to celebrate the
happy event." That seems to me to be something very like the best
philosophy.
These reminiscences prepare the reader to find that Gardner and his
friends, when in Pisa for a night or so during the carnival, were not
precisely a band of reverent Ruskinites. "One of our midshipmen
pelted Lord Hervey in his coach, and when told it was the British
ambassador, and that he looked very angry, immediately hove another
volley at Lady Hervey, observing that she looked better tempered than
his Excellency." Returning to Leghorn, they had a strong party of
English officers to dinner, which was completed by rolling a waiter
in the table-cloth along with the plates and dishes. A midshipman
then took a loaf and let it fall from the second-floor window upon
the jaw of an Italian in the street; which floored him. No one,
however, minded. "Would this," asks Gardner, "have been the case in
England, where every hole and corner has a board threatening
prosecution, and if you pass two or three stopping in the street,
their conversation will be about law, hanging, or trade?"
Gardner's last ship was the _Brunswick_, on which one Rea was captain
of marines. "Rea," says Gardner, "although a very worthy fellow, had
a great antipathy to the West Indies, and was always cursing Venables
and Perm for taking possession of Jamaica, and was sorry Oliver
Cromwell did not make them a head shorter for their pains. I have
often heard him repeat the following lines as a morning and evening
hymn:--
"'Venables and Perm,
Two bloody-minded men,
In an evil hour
Those seas did explore,
And, blundering about,
This cursed hole found out;
And for so doing
The devil has them stewing;
And with him they may remain
Till we come this way again,
Which we think, howsomdever,
(As our boatswain says) will be never,
And let all the men say Amen.'"
On one glad morning, however, news at last came that peace was
declared and the _Brunswick_ was to return home and its crew paid
off. The master brought the glad tidings, thundering at Gardner's
door at five in the morning, and singing this lusty song:--
"'Jolly tars, have you heard the news?
There's peace both by land and by sea;
Great guns are no more to be used,
Disbanded we all are to be.'
'Oh,' says the admiral, 'the wars are all over.'
Says the captain, 'My heart it will break.'
'Oh,' says the bloody first lieutenant,
'What course of life shall I take?'"
But the news was false, and the _Brunswick_ was sent back to Jamaica
again, and so dispirited was he that Gardner then left the sea for
ever.
It is our gain that he carried away from it a marvellous memory. But
I think he knew he had made a mistake in leaving, for there is much
wistfulness between the lines of his story. In one place he writes:
"We used to fit a tarpaulin in the weather fore-rigging as a screen,
and many a pleasant hour have I passed under its lee, with a glass of
grog, and hearing long-winded stories. Alas! how dead are times now."
Is not that one of the themes the plaintive melody of which runs
through most middle-aged and older lives: "Alas! how dead are times
now?" This is my comment, not the brave Gardner's.