One day a horrid grampus caught me all by the nose,
An' swung me up to the land,
An' I never went to sea again, as everybody knows,
And as everybody well may understand, 'derstand, 'derstand,
And as everybody well may understand.
Chorus.--Then the raging sea, etcetera.
The plaudits with which this song was received were, it need scarcely be
remarked, due more to the vigour of the chorus and the enthusiasm of the
audience than to intrinsic merit. Even Robin Wright was carried off his
legs for the moment, and, modest though he was, broke in at the chorus
with such effect--his voice being shrill and clear--that, he
unintentionally outyelled all the rest, and would have fled in
consternation from the saloon if he had not been caught and forcibly
detained by the sporting electrician, who demanded what right he had to
raise his steam-whistle in that fashion.
"But I say, young Wright," he added in a lower tone, leading our hero
aside, "what's this rumour I hear about a ghost in the steward's cabin?"
"Oh! it is nothing to speak of," replied Robin, with a laugh. "The lad
they call Stumps got a fright--that's all."
"But that's enough. Let us hear about it."
"Well, I suppose you know," said Robin, "that there's a ghost in the
Great Eastern."
"No, I don't know it from personal experience, but I have heard a report
to that effect."
"Well, I was down in Jim Slagg's berth, having a chat with him about the
nature of electric currents--for he has a very inquiring mind,--and
somehow we diverged to ghosts, and began to talk of the ghost of the
Great Eastern.
"`I don't believe in the Great Eastern ghost--no, nor in ghosts of any
kind,' said Stumps, who was sitting near us eating a bit of cheese.
"`But I believe in 'em,' said the boy Jeff, who was seated on the other
side of the table, and looked at us so earnestly that we could scarce
help smiling--though we didn't feel in a smiling humour at the time, for
it was getting dark, and we had got to talking in low tones and looking
anxiously over our shoulders, you know--
"`Oh yes, I know,' replied the sportsman, with a laugh; `I have
shuddered and grue-oo-ed many a time over ghost-stories. Well?'
"`_I_ don't believe in 'em, Jeff. Why do _you_?' asked Stumps, in a
scoffing tone.
"`Because I hear one every night a'most when I go down into the dark
places below to fetch things. There's one particular spot where the
ghost goes tap-tap-tapping continually.'
"`Fiddlededee,' said Stumps.
"`Come down, and you shall hear it for yourself,' said Jeff.
"Now, they say that Stumps is a coward, though he boasts a good deal--"
"You may say," interrupted the sportsman, "that Stumps is a coward
_because_ he boasts a good deal. Boasting is often a sign of
cowardice--though not always."
"Well," continued Robin, "being ashamed to draw back, I suppose, he
agreed to accompany Jeff.
"`Won't you come too, Slagg?' said Stumps.
"`No; I don't care a button for ghosts. Besides, I'm too busy, but
Wright will go. There, don't bother me!' said Jim.
"I noticed, as I went last out of the room, that Slagg rose quickly and
pulled a sheet off one of the beds. Afterwards, looking back, I saw him
slip out and run down the passage in the opposite direction. I
suspected he was about some mischief, but said nothing.
"It was getting dark, as I have said, though not dark enough for
lighting the lamps, and in some corners below it was as dark as
midnight. To one of these places Jeff led us.
"`Mind how you go now,' whispered Jeff; `it's here somewhere, and
there's a hole too--look-out--there it is!'
"`What! the ghost?' whispered Stumps, beginning to feel uneasy. To say
truth, I began to feel uneasy myself without well knowing why. At that
moment I fell over something, and came down with a crash that shook
Stumps's nerves completely out of order.
"`I say, let's go back,' he muttered in a tremulous voice.
"`No, no,' whispered Jeff seizing Stumps by the arm with a sudden grip
that made him give a short yelp, `we are at the place now. It's in this
dark passage. Listen!'
"We all held our breath and listened. For a few seconds we heard
nothing, but presently a slight tapping was heard.
"`I've heard,' whispered Jeff in a low tone, `that when the big ship was
buildin', one o' the plate-riveters disappeared in some hole between the
two skins o' the ship hereabouts, and his comrades, not bein' able to
find him, were obliged at last to rivet him in, which they did so tight
that even his ghost could not get out, so it goes on tappin', as you
hear, an' is likely to go on tappin' for ever.'
"`Bosh!' whispered Stumps; thus politely intimating his disbelief, but I
felt him trembling all over notwithstanding.
"At that moment we saw a dim shadowy whitish object at the other end of
the dark passage. `Wha'--wha'--what's that?' said I.
"Stumps gasped. I heard his teeth chattering, and I think his knees
were knocking together. Jeff made no sound, and it was too dark to see
his face. Suddenly the object rushed at us. There was no noise of
footsteps--only a muffled sound and a faint hissing. I stood still,
unable to move. So did Jeff. I felt the hair of my head rising.
Stumps gasped again--then turned and fled. The creature, whatever it
was, brushed past us with a hideous laugh. I guessed at once that it
was Jim Slagg, but evidently Stumps didn't, for he uttered an awful yell
that would have roused the whole ship if she had been of an ordinary
size; at the same moment he tripped and fell on the thing that had upset
me, and the ghost, leaping over him, vanished from our sight.
"To my surprise, on returning to our cabin, we found Slagg as we had
left him, with both hands on his forehead poring over his book. I was
almost as much surprised to see Jeff sit down and laugh heartily.--Now,
what _do_ you think it could have been?"
"It was Slagg, of course," answered the sporting electrician.
"Yes, but what causes the tapping?"
"Oh, that is no doubt some little trifle--a chip of wood, or bit of wire
left hanging loose, which shakes about when the ship heaves."
A sudden tramping of feet overhead brought this ghostly discussion to an
abrupt close, and caused every man in the saloon to rush on deck with a
terrible feeling in his heart that something had gone wrong.
"Not broken?" asked an electrician with a pale face on reaching the
deck.
"Oh no, sir," replied an engineer, with an anxious look, "not quite so
bad as that, but a whale has taken a fancy to inspect us, and he is
almost _too_ attentive."
So it was. A large Greenland whale was playing about the big ship,
apparently under the impression that she was a giant of his own species,
and it had passed perilously close to the cable.
A second time it came up, rolling high above the waves. It went close
past the stern--rose again and dived with a gentle flop of its great
tail, which, if it had touched the cable, would have cut it like a
thread. At that trying moment, as they saw its huge back glittering in
the moonlight, the hearts of the helpless spectators appeared absolutely
to stand still. When the monster dived its side even touched the cable,
but did not damage it. Being apparently satisfied by that time that the
ship was not a friend, the whale finally disappeared in the depths of
its ocean home.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Those who visited the Crystal Palace at Sydenham during the recent
Electrical Exhibition had an opportunity of seeing the shells here
referred to under a powerful microscope.