HE GOES TO SUPPER AT THE SIGN OF THE BALTIMORE CLIPPER
In the afternoon our pilot was all alive with his orders; we hove up
the anchor, and after a deal of pulling, and hauling, and jamming
against other ships, we wedged our way through a lock at high tide; and
about dark, succeeded in working up to a berth in _Prince’s Dock._ The
hawsers and tow-lines being then coiled away, the crew were told to go
ashore, select their boarding-house, and sit down to supper.
Here it must be mentioned, that owing to the strict but necessary
regulations of the Liverpool docks, no fires of any kind are allowed on
board the vessels within them; and hence, though the sailors are
supposed to sleep in the forecastle, yet they must get their meals
ashore, or live upon cold potatoes. To a ship, the American merchantmen
adopt the former plan; the owners, of course, paying the landlord’s
bill; which, in a large crew remaining at Liverpool more than six
weeks, as we of the Highlander did, forms no inconsiderable item in the
expenses of the voyage. Other ships, however—the economical Dutch and
Danish, for instance, and sometimes the prudent Scotch—feed their
luckless tars in dock, with precisely the same fare which they give
them at sea; taking their salt junk ashore to be cooked, which, indeed,
is but scurvy sort of treatment, since it is very apt to induce the
scurvy. A parsimonious proceeding like this is regarded with
immeasurable disdain by the crews of the New York vessels, who, if
their captains treated them after that fashion, would soon bolt and
run.
It was quite dark, when we all sprang ashore; and, for the first time,
I felt dusty particles of the renowned British soil penetrating into my
eyes and lungs. As for _stepping_ on it, that was out of the question,
in the well-paved and flagged condition of the streets; and I did not
have an opportunity to do so till some time afterward, when I got out
into the country; and then, indeed, I saw England, and snuffed its
immortal loam—but not till then.
Jackson led the van; and after stopping at a tavern, took us up this
street, and down that, till at last he brought us to a narrow lane,
filled with boarding-houses, spirit-vaults, and sailors. Here we
stopped before the sign of a Baltimore Clipper, flanked on one side by
a gilded bunch of grapes and a bottle, and on the other by the British
Unicorn and American Eagle, lying down by each other, like the lion and
lamb in the millennium.—A very judicious and tasty device, showing a
delicate apprehension of the propriety of conciliating American sailors
in an English boarding-house; and yet in no way derogating from the
honor and dignity of England, but placing the two nations, indeed, upon
a footing of perfect equality.
Near the unicorn was a very small animal, which at first I took for a
young unicorn; but it looked more like a yearling lion. It was holding
up one paw, as if it had a splinter in it; and on its head was a sort
of basket-hilted, low-crowned hat, without a rim. I asked a sailor
standing by, what this animal meant, when, looking at me with a grin,
he answered, “Why, youngster, don’t you know what that means? It’s a
young jackass, limping off with a kedgeree pot of rice out of the
cuddy.”
Though it was an English boarding-house, it was kept by a broken-down
American mariner, one Danby, a dissolute, idle fellow, who had married
a buxom English wife, and now lived upon her industry; for the lady,
and not the sailor, proved to be the head of the establishment.
She was a hale, good-looking woman, about forty years old, and among
the seamen went by the name of _“Handsome Mary.”_ But though, from the
dissipated character of her spouse, Mary had become the business
personage of the house, bought the marketing, overlooked the tables,
and conducted all the more important arrangements, yet she was by no
means an Amazon to her husband, if she _did_ play a masculine part in
other matters. No; and the more is the pity, poor Mary seemed too much
attached to Danby, to seek to rule him as a termagant. Often she went
about her household concerns with the tears in her eyes, when, after a
fit of intoxication, this brutal husband of hers had been beating her.
The sailors took her part, and many a time volunteered to give him a
thorough thrashing before her eyes; but Mary would beg them not to do
so, as Danby would, no doubt, be a better boy next time.
But there seemed no likelihood of this, so long as that abominable bar
of his stood upon the premises. As you entered the passage, it stared
upon you on one side, ready to entrap all guests.
It was a grotesque, old-fashioned, castellated sort of a sentry-box,
made of a smoky-colored wood, and with a grating in front, that lifted
up like a portcullis. And here would this Danby sit all the day long;
and when customers grew thin, would patronize his own ale himself,
pouring down mug after mug, as if he took himself for one of his own
quarter-casks.
Sometimes an old crony of his, one Bob Still, would come in; and then
they would occupy the sentry-box together, and swill their beer in
concert. This pot-friend of Danby was portly as a dray-horse, and had a
round, sleek, oily head, twinkling eyes, and moist red cheeks. He was a
lusty troller of ale-songs; and, with his mug in his hand, would lean
his waddling bulk partly out of the sentry-box, singing:
“No frost, no snow, no wind, I trow,
Can hurt me if I wold,
I am so wrapt, and thoroughly lapt
In jolly good ale and old,—
I stuff my skin so full within,
Of jolly good ale and old.”
Or this,
“Four wines and brandies I detest,
Here’s richer juice from barley press’d.
It is the quintessence of malt,
And they that drink it want no salt.
Come, then, quick come, and take this beer,
And water henceforth you’ll forswear.”
Alas! Handsome Mary. What avail all thy private tears and remonstrances
with the incorrigible Danby, so long as that brewery of a toper, Bob
Still, daily eclipses thy threshold with the vast diameter of his
paunch, and enthrones himself in the sentry-box, holding divided rule
with thy spouse?
The more he drinks, the fatter and rounder waxes Bob; and the songs
pour out as the ale pours in, on the well-known principle, that the air
in a vessel is displaced and expelled, as the liquid rises higher and
higher in it.
But as for Danby, the miserable Yankee grows sour on good cheer, and
dries up the thinner for every drop of fat ale he imbibes. It is plain
and demonstrable, that much ale is not good for Yankees, and operates
differently upon them from what it does upon a Briton: ale must be
drank in a fog and a drizzle.
Entering the sign of the Clipper, Jackson ushered us into a small room
on one side, and shortly after, Handsome Mary waited upon us with a
courtesy, and received the compliments of several old guests among our
crew. She then disappeared to provide our supper. While my shipmates
were now engaged in tippling, and talking with numerous old
acquaintances of theirs in the neighborhood, who thronged about the
door, I remained alone in the little room, meditating profoundly upon
the fact, that I was now seated upon an English bench, under an English
roof, in an English tavern, forming an integral part of the English
empire. It was a staggering fact, but none the less true.
I examined the place attentively; it was a long, narrow, little room,
with one small arched window with red curtains, looking out upon a
smoky, untidy yard, bounded by a dingy brick-wall, the top of which was
horrible with pieces of broken old bottles, stuck into mortar.
A dull lamp swung overhead, placed in a wooden ship suspended from the
ceiling. The walls were covered with a paper, representing an endless
succession of vessels of all nations continually circumnavigating the
apartment. By way of a pictorial mainsail to one of these ships, a map
was hung against it, representing in faded colors the flags of all
nations. From the street came a confused uproar of ballad-singers,
bawling women, babies, and drunken sailors.
And this is England?
But where are the old abbeys, and the York Minsters, and the lord
mayors, and coronations, and the May-poles, and fox-hunters, and Derby
races, and the dukes and duchesses, and the Count d’Orsays, which, from
all my reading, I had been in the habit of associating with England?
Not the most distant glimpse of them was to be seen.
Alas! Wellingborough, thought I, I fear you stand but a poor chance to
see the sights. You are nothing but a poor sailor boy; and the Queen is
not going to send a deputation of noblemen to invite you to St.
James’s.
It was then, I began to see, that my prospects of seeing the world as a
sailor were, after all, but very doubtful; for sailors only go _round_
the world, without going _into_ it; and their reminiscences of travel
are only a dim recollection of a chain of tap-rooms surrounding the
globe, parallel with the Equator. They but touch the perimeter of the
circle; hover about the edges of terra-firma; and only land upon
wharves and pier-heads. They would dream as little of traveling inland
to see Kenilworth, or Blenheim Castle, as they would of sending a car
overland to the Pope, when they touched at Naples.
From these reveries I was soon roused, by a servant girl hurrying from
room to room, in shrill tones exclaiming, “Supper, supper ready.”
Mounting a rickety staircase, we entered a room on the second floor.
Three tall brass candlesticks shed a smoky light upon smoky walls, of
what had once been sea-blue, covered with sailor-scrawls of foul
anchors, lovers’ sonnets, and ocean ditties. On one side, nailed
against the wainscot in a row, were the four knaves of cards, each Jack
putting his best foot foremost as usual. What these signified I never
heard.
But such ample cheer! Such a groaning table! Such a superabundance of
solids and substantial! Was it possible that sailors fared thus?—the
sailors, who at sea live upon salt beef and biscuit?
First and foremost, was a mighty pewter dish, big as Achilles’ shield,
sustaining a pyramid of smoking sausages. This stood at one end; midway
was a similar dish, heavily laden with farmers’ slices of head-cheese;
and at the opposite end, a congregation of beef-steaks, piled tier over
tier. Scattered at intervals between, were side dishes of boiled
potatoes, eggs by the score, bread, and pickles; and on a stand
adjoining, was an ample reserve of every thing on the supper table.
We fell to with all our hearts; wrapt ourselves in hot jackets of
beef-steaks; curtailed the sausages with great celerity; and sitting
down before the head-cheese, soon razed it to its foundations.
Toward the close of the entertainment, I suggested to Peggy, one of the
girls who had waited upon us, that a cup of tea would be a nice thing
to take; and I would thank her for one. She replied that it was too
late for tea; but she would get me a cup of _“swipes”_ if I wanted it.
Not knowing what _“swipes”_ might be, I thought I would run the risk
and try it; but it proved a miserable beverage, with a musty, sour
flavor, as if it had been a decoction of spoiled pickles. I never
patronized _swipes_ again; but gave it a wide berth; though, at dinner
afterward, it was furnished to an unlimited extent, and drunk by most
of my shipmates, who pronounced it good.
But Bob Still would not have pronounced it so; for this _stripes, as I_
learned, was a sort of cheap substitute for beer; or a bastard kind of
beer; or the washings and rinsings of old beer-barrels. But I do not
remember now what they said it was, precisely. I only know, that
_swipes_ was my abomination. As for the taste of it, I can only
describe it as answering to the name itself; which is certainly
significant of something vile. But it is drunk in large quantities by
the poor people about Liverpool, which, perhaps, in some degree,
accounts for their poverty.