A SALT-JUNK CLUB IN A MAN-OF-WAR, WITH A NOTICE TO QUIT.
It was about the period of the Cologne-water excitement that my
self-conceit was not a little wounded, and my sense of delicacy
altogether shocked, by a polite hint received from the cook of the mess
to which I happened to belong. To understand the matter, it is needful
to enter into preliminaries.
The common seamen in a large frigate are divided into some thirty or
forty messes, put down on the purser’s books as _Mess_ No. 1, _Mess_
No. 2, _Mess_ No. 3, etc. The members of each mess club, their rations
of provisions, and breakfast, dine, and sup together in allotted
intervals between the guns on the main-deck. In undeviating rotation,
the members of each mess (excepting the petty-officers) take their turn
in performing the functions of cook and steward. And for the time
being, all the affairs of the club are subject to their inspection and
control.
It is the cook’s business, also, to have an eye to the general
interests of his mess; to see that, when the aggregated allowances of
beef, bread, etc., are served out by one of the master’s mates, the
mess over which he presides receives its full share, without stint or
subtraction. Upon the berth-deck he has a chest, in which to keep his
pots, pans, spoons, and small stores of sugar, molasses, tea, and
flour.
But though entitled a cook, strictly speaking, the head of the mess is
no cook at all; for the cooking for the crew is all done by a high and
mighty functionary, officially called the “_ship’s cook_,” assisted by
several deputies. In our frigate, this personage was a dignified
coloured gentleman, whom the men dubbed “_Old Coffee;_” and his
assistants, negroes also, went by the poetical appellations of
“_Sunshine_,” “_Rose-water_,” and “_May-day_.”
Now the _ship’s cooking_ required very little science, though old
Coffee often assured us that he had graduated at the New York Astor
House, under the immediate eye of the celebrated Coleman and Stetson.
All he had to do was, in the first place, to keep bright and clean the
three huge coppers, or caldrons, in which many hundred pounds of beef
were daily boiled. To this end, Rose-water, Sunshine, and May-day every
morning sprang into their respective apartments, stripped to the waist,
and well provided with bits of soap-stone and sand. By exercising these
in a very vigorous manner, they threw themselves into a violent
perspiration, and put a fine polish upon the interior of the coppers.
Sunshine was the bard of the trio; and while all three would be busily
employed clattering their soap-stones against the metal, he would
exhilarate them with some remarkable St. Domingo melodies; one of which
was the following:
“Oh! I los’ my shoe in an old canoe,
Johnio! come Winum so!
Oh! I los’ my boot in a pilot-boat,
Johnio! come Winum so!
Den rub-a-dub de copper, oh!
Oh! copper rub-a-dub-a-oh!”
When I listened to these jolly Africans, thus making gleeful their toil
by their cheering songs, I could not help murmuring against that
immemorial rule of men-of-war, which forbids the sailors to sing out,
as in merchant-vessels, when pulling ropes, or occupied at any other
ship’s duty. Your only music, at such times, is the shrill pipe of the
boatswain’s mate, which is almost worse than no music at all. And if
the boatswain’s mate is not by, you must pull the ropes, like convicts,
in profound silence; or else endeavour to impart unity to the exertions
of all hands, by singing out mechanically, _one_, _two_, _three_, and
then pulling all together.
Now, when Sunshine, Rose-water, and May-day have so polished the ship’s
coppers, that a white kid glove might be drawn along the inside and
show no stain, they leap out of their holes, and the water is poured in
for the coffee. And the coffee being boiled, and decanted off in
bucketfuls, the cooks of the messes march up with their salt beef for
dinner, strung upon strings and tallied with labels; all of which are
plunged together into the self-same coppers, and there boiled. When,
upon the beef being fished out with a huge pitch-fork, the water for
the evening’s tea is poured in; which, consequently possesses a flavour
not unlike that of shank-soup.
From this it will be seen, that, so far as cooking is concerned, a
“_cook of the mess_” has very little to do; merely carrying his
provisions to and from the grand democratic cookery. Still, in some
things, his office involves many annoyances. Twice a week butter and
cheese are served out—so much to each man—and the mess-cook has the
sole charge of these delicacies. The great difficulty consists in so
catering for the mess, touching these luxuries, as to satisfy all. Some
guzzlers are for devouring the butter at a meal, and finishing off with
the cheese the same day; others contend for saving it up against
_Banyan Day_, when there is nothing but beef and bread; and others,
again, are for taking a very small bit of butter and cheese, by way of
dessert, to each and every meal through the week. All this gives rise
to endless disputes, debates, and altercations.
Sometimes, with his mess-cloth—a square of painted canvas—set out on
deck between the guns, garnished with pots, and pans, and _kids_, you
see the mess-cook seated on a matchtub at its head, his trowser legs
rolled up and arms bared, presiding over the convivial party.
“Now, men, you can’t have any butter to-day. I’m saving it up for
to-morrow. You don’t know the value of butter, men. You, Jim, take your
hoof off the cloth! Devil take me, if some of you chaps haven’t no more
manners than so many swines! Quick, men, quick; bear a hand, and
‘_scoff_’ (eat) away.—I’ve got my to-morrow’s _duff_ to make yet, and
some of you fellows keep _scoffing_ as if I had nothing to do but sit
still here on this here tub here, and look on. There, there, men,
you’ve all had enough: so sail away out of this, and let me clear up
the wreck.”
In this strain would one of the periodical cooks of mess No. 15 talk to
us. He was a tall, resolute fellow, who had once been a brakeman on a
railroad, and he kept us all pretty straight; from his fiat there was
no appeal.
But it was not thus when the turn came to others among us. Then it was
_look out for squalls_. The business of dining became a bore, and
digestion was seriously impaired by the unamiable discourse we had over
our _salt horse_.
I sometimes thought that the junks of lean pork—which were boiled in
their own bristles, and looked gaunt and grim, like pickled chins of
half-famished, unwashed Cossacks—had something to do with creating the
bristling bitterness at times prevailing in our mess. The men tore off
the tough hide from their pork, as if they were Indians scalping
Christians.
Some cursed the cook for a rogue, who kept from us our butter and
cheese, in order to make away with it himself in an underhand manner;
selling it at a premium to other messes, and thus accumulating a
princely fortune at our expense. Others anthematised him for his
slovenliness, casting hypercritical glances into their pots and pans,
and scraping them with their knives. Then he would be railed at for his
miserable “duffs,” and other shortcoming preparations.
Marking all this from the beginning, I, White-Jacket, was sorely
troubled with the idea, that, in the course of time, my own turn would
come round to undergo the same objurgations. How to escape, I knew not.
However, when the dreaded period arrived, I received the keys of office
(the keys of the mess-chest) with a resigned temper, and offered up a
devout ejaculation for fortitude under the trial. I resolved, please
Heaven, to approve myself an unexceptionable caterer, and the most
impartial of stewards.
The first day there was “_duff_” to make—a business which devolved upon
the mess-cooks, though the boiling of it pertained to Old Coffee and
his deputies. I made up my mind to lay myself out on that _duff_; to
centre all my energies upon it; to put the very soul of art into it,
and achieve an unrivalled _duff_—a _duff_ that should put out of
conceit all other _duffs_, and for ever make my administration
memorable.
From the proper functionary the flour was obtained, and the raisins;
the beef-fat, or “_slush_,” from Old Coffee; and the requisite supply
of water from the scuttle-butt. I then went among the various cooks, to
compare their receipts for making “duffs:” and having well weighed them
all, and gathered from each a choice item to make an original receipt
of my own, with due deliberation and solemnity I proceeded to business.
Placing the component parts in a tin pan, I kneaded them together for
an hour, entirely reckless as to pulmonary considerations, touching the
ruinous expenditure of breath; and having decanted the semi-liquid
dough into a canvas-bag, secured the muzzle, tied on the tally, and
delivered it to Rose-water, who dropped the precious bag into the
coppers, along with a score or two of others.
Eight bells had struck. The boatswain and his mates had piped the hands
to dinner; my mess-cloth was set out, and my messmates were assembled,
knife in hand, all ready to precipitate themselves upon the devoted
_duff_: Waiting at the grand cookery till my turn came, I received the
bag of pudding, and gallanting it into the mess, proceeded to loosen
the string.
It was an anxious, I may say, a fearful moment. My hands trembled;
every eye was upon me; my reputation and credit were at stake. Slowly I
undressed the _duff_, dandling it upon my knee, much as a nurse does a
baby about bed-time. The excitement increased, as I curled down the bag
from the pudding; it became intense, when at last I plumped it into the
pan, held up to receive it by an eager hand. Bim! it fell like a man
shot down in a riot. Distraction! It was harder than a sinner’s heart;
yea, tough as the cock that crowed on the morn that Peter told a lie.
“Gentlemen of the mess, for heaven’s sake! permit me one word. I have
done my duty by that duff—I have——”
But they beat down my excuses with a storm of criminations. One present
proposed that the fatal pudding should be tied round my neck, like a
mill-stone, and myself pushed overboard. No use, no use; I had failed;
ever after, that duff lay heavy at my stomach and my heart.
After this, I grew desperate; despised popularity; returned scorn for
scorn; till at length my week expired, and in the duff-bag I
transferred the keys of office to the next man on the roll.
Somehow, there had never been a very cordial feeling between this mess
and me; all along they had nourished a prejudice against my white
jacket. They must have harbored the silly fancy that in it I gave
myself airs, and wore it in order to look consequential; perhaps, as a
cloak to cover pilferings of tit-bits from the mess. But to out with
the plain truth, they themselves were not a very irreproachable set.
Considering the sequel I am coming to, this avowal may be deemed sheer
malice; but for all that, I cannot avoid speaking my mind.
After my week of office, the mess gradually changed their behaviour to
me; they cut me to the heart; they became cold and reserved; seldom or
never addressed me at meal-times without invidious allusions to my
_duff_, and also to my jacket, and its dripping in wet weather upon the
mess-cloth. However, I had no idea that anything serious, on their
part, was brewing; but alas! so it turned out.
We were assembled at supper one evening when I noticed certain winks
and silent hints tipped to the cook, who presided. He was a little,
oily fellow, who had once kept an oyster-cellar ashore; he bore me a
grudge. Looking down on the mess-cloth, he observed that some fellows
never knew when their room was better than their company. This being a
maxim of indiscriminate application, of course I silently assented to
it, as any other reasonable man would have done. But this remark was
followed up by another, to the effect that, not only did some fellows
never know when their room was better than their company, but they
persisted in staying when their company wasn’t wanted; and by so doing
disturbed the serenity of society at large. But this, also, was a
general observation that could not be gainsaid. A long and ominous
pause ensued; during which I perceived every eye upon me, and my white
jacket; while the cook went on to enlarge upon the disagreeableness of
a perpetually damp garment in the mess, especially when that garment
was white. This was coming nearer home.
Yes, they were going to black-ball me; but I resolved to sit it out a
little longer; never dreaming that my moralist would proceed to
extremities, while all hands were present. But bethinking him that by
going this roundabout way he would never get at his object, he went off
on another tack; apprising me, in substance, that he was instructed by
the whole mess, then and there assembled, to give me warning to seek
out another club, as they did not longer fancy the society either of
myself or my jacket.
I was shocked. Such a want of tact and delicacy! Common propriety
suggested that a point-blank intimation of that nature should be
conveyed in a private interview; or, still better, by note. I
immediately rose, tucked my jacket about me, bowed, and departed.
And now, to do myself justice, I must add that, the next day, I was
received with open arms by a glorious set of fellows—Mess No.
1!—numbering, among the rest, my noble Captain Jack Chase.
This mess was principally composed of the headmost men of the gun-deck;
and, out of a pardonable self-conceit, they called themselves the
“_Forty-two-pounder Club;_” meaning that they were, one and all,
fellows of large intellectual and corporeal calibre. Their mess-cloth
was well located. On their starboard hand was Mess No. 2, embracing
sundry rare jokers and high livers, who waxed gay and epicurean over
their salt fare, and were known as the “_Society for the Destruction of
Beef and Pork_.” On the larboard hand was Mess No. 31, made up entirely
of fore-top-men, a dashing, blaze-away set of men-of-war’s-men, who
called themselves the “_Cape Horn Snorters and Neversink Invincibles_.”
Opposite, was one of the marine messes, mustering the aristocracy of
the marine corps—the two corporals, the drummer and fifer, and some six
or eight rather gentlemanly privates, native-born Americans, who had
served in the Seminole campaigns of Florida; and they now enlivened
their salt fare with stories of wild ambushes in the Everglades; and
one of them related a surprising tale of his hand-to-hand encounter
with Osceola, the Indian chief, whom he fought one morning from
daybreak till breakfast time. This slashing private also boasted that
he could take a chip from between your teeth at twenty paces; he
offered to bet any amount on it; and as he could get no one to hold the
chip, his boast remained for ever good.
Besides many other attractions which the _Forty-two-pounder Club_
furnished, it had this one special advantage, that, owing to there
being so many _petty officers_ in it, all the members of the mess were
exempt from doing duty as cooks and stewards. A fellow called _a
steady-cook_, attended to that business during the entire cruise. He
was a long, lank, pallid varlet, going by the name of Shanks. In very
warm weather this Shanks would sit at the foot of the mess-cloth,
fanning himself with the front flap of his frock or shirt, which he
inelegantly wore over his trousers. Jack Chase, the President of the
Club, frequently remonstrated against this breach of good manners; but
the _steady-cook_ had somehow contracted the habit, and it proved
incurable.
For a time, Jack Chase, out of a polite nervousness touching myself, as
a newly-elected member of the club, would frequently endeavour to
excuse to me the vulgarity of Shanks. One day he wound up his remarks
by the philosophic reflection—“But, White-Jacket, my dear fellow, what
can you expect of him? Our real misfortune is, that our noble club
should be obliged to dine with its cook.”
There were several of these _steady-cooks_ on board; men of no mark or
consideration whatever in the ship; lost to all noble promptings;
sighing for no worlds to conquer, and perfectly contented with mixing
their _duff’s_, and spreading their mess-cloths, and mustering their
pots and pans together three times every day for a three years’ cruise.
They were very seldom to be seen on the spar-deck, but kept below out
of sight.